War on the cheap? No. A war on a Mastercard.

[txaslftist]

I read the homepage editorial to the effect that this war was being fought at basically no cost to the American People. Other than bodies for the war, of course, the editorial is substantially correct in that Americans at home are not being asked to sacrifice to pay for the war effort. We aren't buying bonds, we aren't rationing, we aren't being asked to recycle or go to work in war factories or turn over our production to "bread and bullets." Aside from an occasional view of carnage or of smoke from a bomb with a grave-faced reporter looking out from a Baghdad hotel balcony, the war might as well not be happening.

One must ask oneself, is this a cheap war? At nearly three hundred billion dollars so far and an ultimate outlay predicted to approach 1 trillion, there is no way this war can be classified as cheap.

What we have then, is not a 'free' war or a war without costs. This is a war of hidden costs, passed down from us to our economic successors in the form of massive federal debt. Most of this debt is held by foreigners, specifically the Chinese. In addition to the "delayed sacrifice/immediate gratification" nature of this cost, it is also being deliberately hidden.

What do I mean? When the government talks about reducing our deficit or about the scale of our national debt, the cost -both expended and anticipated- of the war is excluded from the calculations. The excuse given, I suppose, is that it is war, and who can anticipate the cost of such an unpredictable endeavor?

The reality is that the administration, in a style and fashion that has become all-too familiar, is deliberately selling this war to the American people. They misrepresented the causes of the war, they misrepresented a connection between this war and 9-11, and they misrepresented both the WMD threat and the true nature of Saddam's regime and its compliance with UN sanctions. They deliberately lied in order to sell this war to the American people, fine.

In addition, they deliberately withold casualty reports, underrepresenting the number of permanently wounded from this war.

With these budgetary hijinks and the deliberate putting off of the war's costs, they are deliberately understating the monetary cost of the war. This is a cost that will be paid by taxpayers and our children, and this war is by no means cheap.

The administration's drive to sell this war, to make it appear cheap and to misrepresent it borders on treason.

[htuttle]

1. Treason never prospers

What's the reason? For if it doth prosper, none dare call it treason!

[txaslftist]

2. I call it damn near treason...

since I think the national interest is just ignored here in favor of individual/corporate interests. I don't think the administration is out to deliberately destroy America, they just don't care if it goes in the crapper.