Learn in Politics, Health and Culture

March 19, 2011 at 3:00 PM

On American Priorities: 10 Things We Could Have Done with the Iraq War Money

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Update: On Dec. 15, 2011, U.S. forces officially ended the war in Iraq, but not before killing 4,500 American troops, 60,000 Iraqis, and bringing the total cost up to

We could have closed every single state’s FY2012 budget deficit—totaling nearly $112 billion—nearly seven times over. That means no protests in Wisconsin, no mass teacher fi

We could have paid tuition and expenses at four-year, private universities for every single member of the U.S. Armed Forces, both

We could have funded the Healthy School Meals Act pilot program, which offers healthful school lunches to America’s increasingly obese schoolchildren, 195,000 times ove

We could have offered lifetime treatment to every single person afflicted with HIV and AIDS in the United

We could have

We could have opened 19,500 Oprah-style luxury boarding schools in Africa, providing an elite educational opportunity for nearly 3

We could have completely funded the war in Afghanistan thus far and still had $393 billion left over to put a bounty on Osama bin Laden’s head. That amount of money would be really hard to turn down.

We could have outfitted 31.2 million detached, single-family homes— about 45 percent <

We could have rescued all of the at-risk social-welfare programs on this chart and still had $740 billion left with which to mess around.

We could have given every kindergarten, elementary, middle, and secondary school teacher in America a $224,000 bonus. Many of them certainly deserve a little extra compensation.