Tuesday, March 21, 2006
From Democratic Underground's Top Ten Conservative Idiots.
Think back to all the rosy predictions that Bush administration officials made about Iraq in 2002, and these days one sticks out - Bush's former White House Economic Adviser Lawrence Lindsay was fired in 2002 after estimating the final cost of the Iraq War at $100-200 billion. At the time, stunned administration officials declared that there was no way the war would cost that much, and that the final figure would be closer to $50-60 billion. But even before the war began, some economists were predicting that it could cost as much as $2 trillion.
And guess what? The Bush administration was wrong, and the economists were right. America is currently spending $200 million a day in Iraq, according to the Congressional Budget Office, which is apparently the same as the gross domestic product of Nigeria.
So why did they get it so wrong? If you guess, "because they're idiots," you're right. Not only did the Bush administration obviously want to underplay the projected costs of the war, but it turns out that some Republicans can't even get their heads around the numbers involved. Last week, while discussing the fact that the federal government's debt limit is now nearly $9 trillion, Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) said, "It's hard to understand what a trillion is. I don't know what it is."
Which might not be that big a deal, if it weren't for the fact that Judd Gregg is chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. Glory be.
And guess what? The Bush administration was wrong, and the economists were right. America is currently spending $200 million a day in Iraq, according to the Congressional Budget Office, which is apparently the same as the gross domestic product of Nigeria.
So why did they get it so wrong? If you guess, "because they're idiots," you're right. Not only did the Bush administration obviously want to underplay the projected costs of the war, but it turns out that some Republicans can't even get their heads around the numbers involved. Last week, while discussing the fact that the federal government's debt limit is now nearly $9 trillion, Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) said, "It's hard to understand what a trillion is. I don't know what it is."
Which might not be that big a deal, if it weren't for the fact that Judd Gregg is chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. Glory be.
# posted by The Punisher @ Tuesday, March 21, 2006 
