Still Hating America.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
In sum: as wars go, this one - in terms of both blood and treasure - has been a drop in the bucket.

:td:

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
...because its the Democrats intention to "slowly bleed" our troops and generally undermine of our President's foreign policy.

True Patriots, all of them.

No, you yutz -- we'll never know whether it would have made a difference to do things differently three years ago.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
In sum: as wars go, this one - in terms of both blood and treasure - has been a drop in the bucket.

It's more costly, in terms of (certainly American, which is what was under discussion, and possibly Iraqi) blood and treasure than if we hadn't done anything in Iraq at all.

And go tell your summation to the maimed soldiers and their families, and the families of dead soldiers, and then tell all of us how the US or the world are over all net safer since we invaded Iraq. Not Iraqis as a group, but the world as a whole. I don't think it is. Possibly, the actions in Afghanistan have made the world net better off, and may have outweighed the damage we've done by what has happened in Iraq. Possibly. I don't think we can assess that at this point.

And the American death tolls would have been higher if medicine were in the same state it was in the 1960s and 1970s, and still higher if it'd been how it was in the 30s and 40s.

The Economist article was making two points in that paragraph, and a large number of points in the whole thing. Spanky's quote presented only a very small slice.

[ltl/fb]

Originally posted by Spanky
:td:

Indeed. Touchdown. I think that is, hands down, the absolute best interpretation of the war in Iraq and the clear outcome of our actions in the Middle East since 9/11.

[Adder]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
Shouldn't things (everything being equal) be cheaper, as a percentage of GDP, when GDP grows?

Why would that be? GDP growth would be primarily due to inflation, which would assumably effect the cost of waging war proportionately.

OK, I just looked it up before going home. Motherfucker, Spanky, nice leaving out of the beginning of the paragraph you quoted:

"Mr Bush's latest request (to which must be added a supplementary $100 billion for the current fiscal year) would bring the total cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to $661 billion since 2001. That would make them a greater swallower of American treasure than the Vietnam war (in real dollars), though nowhere near as costly to America in terms of blood (3,100 deaths so far, versus 58,000)."

I don't get this. they mean a greater consumer of treasure in inflation adjusted dollar? Meaning that it costs more, although economic growth has made it a smaller portion of GDP?

[Adder]

Originally posted by Spanky
Those tax cuts led to growth that is now reducing the deficit every year. If the growth continues we can balance the budget without raising taxes.

Just keep telling yourself that.

[Adder]

Originally posted by Spanky
1) First, I just directly quoted that Economist article. I didn't add any verbiage at all. It was all from the Economist. How could it not be saying what I said it was saying. It spoke for itself. Can you really be this stupid?

2) The first part of the paragraph implied that someone might think the Iraq war was expensive if you just look at real dollar terms compared to the Vietnam war, but when you look at the percentage of the GDP compared to the Vietnam war you realize it is half as expensive. Only including the first part of the paragraph would be misleading as to the intent of the article, but the last part of the paragraph contained the main point of the paragraph.

3) Look. This is really not that complicated. Try and wrap your simple mind around it. In real dollar terms, by todays standards Vietnam was not that expensive. If you look at our current three trillion dollar budget, Vietnam, doesn't look like it cost so much. But actually, if you understand that our government had much less income then, and the American people had much less income, the expense of the war was much harder for the American people to bear, than if you just look at it in real dollar terms today.

When discussing how much you spend on stuff in the federal budget, and comparing costs over an entire generation, real dollar terms is not helpful at all to see what sort of priortiy a certain item got. You have to look at in terms of percentage of GDP to see how much of a priority, or how expensive it really was to the government and American people.

In real dollar terms the expense of the Revolutoinary War today would seem like peanuts. Probably less than the cost of builing one of our thirteen carriers. But if you look at the cost of the war in terms of American GDP, then you can truely understand what a financial burden the revolutionary war was on the colonies.

Once again, you are quick with the insults. If, in REAL dollar terms, this war is more expensive, that means that the increase in expense is not explained by inflation. (Real means inflation adjusted dollars compared to nominal dollar terms, which we would expect to mean nothing). To the extent that this war is "cheaper" than vietnam, it is apparently only do to economic growth. That is a meaningful comparison to make, but it is not, as your posts suggest, that only reasonable comparison.

In other words, your follow up post do not make clear to me that you understand the difference between real and nominal dollar terms.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Adder
Once again, you are quick with the insults. If, in REAL dollar terms, this war is more expensive, that means that the increase in expense is not explained by inflation. (Real means inflation adjusted dollars compared to nominal dollar terms, which we would expect to mean nothing). To the extent that this war is "cheaper" than vietnam, it is apparently only do to economic growth. That is a meaningful comparison to make, but it is not, as your posts suggest, that only reasonable comparison.

In other words, your follow up post do not make clear to me that you understand the difference between real and nominal dollar terms.

Is everyone on this board a moron? When you defend someone who is irretrievably stupid, it reflects poorly on your intelligence. Yes Adder, I know the sky is Blue and the sun rises in the East. My follow up post made it very clear I was talking about real dollars. You are the only one that has ever discussed nominal dollars, which is even more useless than using real dollar terms. In nominal dollar terms the revolutionary war would have cost about as much as one or two F-16s today (sixty to seventy million dollars) not an aircraft carrier (five to six billion). That is why I used an aircraft carrier in my revolutionary war example and not one or two jet fighters (because in real dollar terms the cost of the revolutionary war would probably be in the billions, but only in millions in nominal terms). In nominal terms the Vietnam War would not have even come close to the cost of the Iraq war. As I stated, in real dollar terms the Vietnam War may have cost a little more, but considering the growth that has gone on, real dollar terms does not mean much when you are comparing money expended by the federal government in different generations.

A real dollar comparison from thirty years ago doesn't mean much when you are talking about federal expenditures because we are so much wealthier today. The only numbers that have any meaning are percentages of GDP. That is why I discussed them, and that is why the Economist ended their paragraph discussing percentages of GDP, because they were trying to point out that a percentage of GDP comparison was much more relevant than a real dollar comparison.

[SlaveNoMore]

ltl/fb
It's more costly, in terms of (certainly American, which is what was under discussion, and possibly Iraqi) blood and treasure than if we hadn't done anything in Iraq at all.

And go tell your summation to the maimed soldiers and their families, and the families of dead soldiers, and then tell all of us how the US or the world are over all net safer since we invaded Iraq. Not Iraqis as a group, but the world as a whole. I don't think it is. Possibly, the actions in Afghanistan have made the world net better off, and may have outweighed the damage we've done by what has happened in Iraq. Possibly. I don't think we can assess that at this point.

And the American death tolls would have been higher if medicine were in the same state it was in the 1960s and 1970s, and still higher if it'd been how it was in the 30s and 40s.

The Economist article was making two points in that paragraph, and a large number of points in the whole thing. Spanky's quote presented only a very small slice.

First, I have said on this Board - repeatedly - that the loss or injury to any American is a tragedy. So do me a favor and spare me your high handed tone. I have merely pointed out - and Adder of all people agreed with me - that as far as modern warfare goes, this one has been quite bloodless for our side, and despite the ghoulish media protestations to the contrary. Spanky was reiterating the same thing.

Second, yes, the future may tell us more, but I can see one thing clearly - our Islamist foe is so focused on "taking it to us" over there, such that they haven't (yet- thank god) hit us here again since 2001. Which, mind you, was only 7 years after the last time they hit us at home in 1993. That was an 8 year gap. We're now approaching 6 years. Not a bad start.

And no, I don't consider Sunni v. Shia deaths anything to do with us. They slaughter each other in every other part of the world, and will continue to do so when we're gone.

[Spanky]

Originally posted by Adder
Why would that be? GDP growth would be primarily due to inflation, which would assumably effect the cost of waging war proportionately.

No GDP growth is mainly due to, believe it or not, economic growth.

Originally posted by Adder I don't get this. they mean a greater consumer of treasure in inflation adjusted dollar? Meaning that it costs more, although economic growth has made it a smaller portion of GDP?

Since the Vietnam war, the people of the United States have gotten a lot wealthier and the US government pulls in a lot more money. Therefore, in real dollar terms (adjusted for inflation) we may now be spending more on defense annually than we did in 1970, but today the the defense budget is a much smaller part of the budget, and a much smaller percentage of GDP than in 1970.

In other words in 1970 the federal government pulled in a hundred dollars, and we spent ten dollars on defense. In real dollar terms (adjusted for inflation) today we pull in two hundred dollars and spend eleven dollars on defense.

Does that make sense?

[SlaveNoMore]

Tyrone Slothrop
No, you yutz -- we'll never know whether it would have made a difference to do things differently three years ago.

Since the change in command and the announcement of the "surge", we've taken out a great deal of Al Qaeda leadership, we're taking over the Sunni gang strongholds in Baghdad, and Moqtada took it on the lamb.

And the Dems, who demanded more troops about 6 months ago, now change their mind when things are turning around.

Who's is the yutz, my box-wine drinking friend?

[Spanky]

Originally posted by ltl/fb
It's more costly, in terms of (certainly American, which is what was under discussion, and possibly Iraqi) blood and treasure than if we hadn't done anything in Iraq at all.

And go tell your summation to the maimed soldiers and their families, and the families of dead soldiers, and then tell all of us how the US or the world are over all net safer since we invaded Iraq. Not Iraqis as a group, but the world as a whole. I don't think it is. Possibly, the actions in Afghanistan have made the world net better off, and may have outweighed the damage we've done by what has happened in Iraq. Possibly. I don't think we can assess that at this point.

And the American death tolls would have been higher if medicine were in the same state it was in the 1960s and 1970s, and still higher if it'd been how it was in the 30s and 40s.

The Economist article was making two points in that paragraph, and a large number of points in the whole thing. Spanky's quote presented only a very small slice.

A little perspective:

Annual Causes of Death in the United States
Tobacco 435,0001
Poor Diet and Physical Inactivity 365,0001
Alcohol 85,000 1
Microbial Agents 75,0001
Toxic Agents 55,0001
Motor Vehicle Crashes 26,3471
Adverse Reactions to Prescription Drugs 32,0002
Suicide 30,6223
Incidents Involving Firearms 29,0001
Homicide 20,3084
Sexual Behaviors 20,0001
All Illicit Drug Use, Direct and Indirect 17,0001, 5

http://www.drugwarfacts.org/causes.htm

The deaths in Iraq are about one twentieth the annual homicide rate. One fortieth of what it was in the late seventies. Even a smaller percentage compared to vehicle accidents. Why aren't people up in arms about lowering the speed limit and increasing traffic safety? Don't you care about all those people dying? You could easily save double the amount of lives lost every year in Iraq by simply making a few traffic safety alterations. Why aren't you concerned about that? Why aren't there mass demonstrations about the fact that we are not making our highways safer?

[Spanky]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
Since the change in command and the announcement of the "surge", we've taken out a great deal of Al Qaeda leadership, we're taking over the Sunni gang strongholds in Baghdad, and Moqtada took it on the lamb.

And the Dems, who demanded more troops about 6 months ago, now change their mind when things are turning around.

Who's is the yutz, my box-wine drinking friend?

Preventing the President from sending more troops is not an alternate strategy. It is just trying to insure that the President's strategy fails. It is just sour grapes, pure and simple. If these idiots really wanted us to succeed, they would propose another strategy for success in their resolution.

It is like a football coach taking two guys off the field because he doesn't like the quarterback's call. He doesn't have his own plan, but he sure as hell isn't going to give the quarterback a chance to have his strategy succeed and make the coach look bad.

[SlaveNoMore]

Spanky
Preventing the President from sending more troops is not an alternate strategy. It is just trying to insure that the President's strategy fails. It is just sour grapes, pure and simple. If these idiots really wanted us to succeed, they would propose another strategy for success in their resolution.

It is like a football coach taking two guys off the field because he doesn't like the quarterback's call. He doesn't have his own plan, but he sure as hell isn't going to give the quarterback a chance to have his strategy succeed and make the coach look bad.

Except the singular decisions of a local football coach have neither the vast worldwide influence nor the historical precedence of what this anti-American House is trying to accomplish here.

[SlaveNoMore]

SlaveNoMore
Except the singular decisions of a local football coach have neither the vast worldwide influence nor the historical precedence of what this anti-American House is trying to accomplish here.

PS:

In a way, I am extremely anxious for the Bush administration to end.

President Bush has become such a "bogeyman" for the Left, that these lunatics are willing to sell out everything we hold dear just to "oppose" him. Blinded by hatred, the majority of the American Left is willing to do just about anything, so long as it is opposite the "Bush" position - including national defense and self protection.

In a way, I am hoping that when he is out of office, this rabid mob will sufficiently calm down, do some self-evaluation, and realize how out of line they really are. Maybe a timeout, and some clarity, is what is necessary to get these folks grounded back to reality.