NYT Article

I have about 4 things on my mind that I could blog about today. (I will probably forget what they are by tomorrow.) But, today, I want to post an article that was published in the New York Times in January. It just came across my desk today. Perhaps you read it when it was originally published or have seen articles like it. However, I thought it was a telling commentary about the Iraq war and the U.S. commitment to other priorities, so I will post it here today.

The New York Times, Business Section

Economix

What $1.2 Trillion Can Buy

By DAVID LEONHARDT

Published: January 17, 2007

The human mind isn’t very well equipped to make sense of a figure like $1.2 trillion. We don’t deal with a trillion of anything in our daily lives, and so when we come across such a big number, it is hard to distinguish it from any other big number. Millions, billions, a trillion — they all start to sound the same.

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Putting the Annual Cost of War in Perspective

The way to come to grips with $1.2 trillion is to forget about the number itself and think instead about what you could buy with the money. When you do that, a trillion stops sounding anything like millions or billions.

For starters, $1.2 trillion would pay for an unprecedented public health campaign — a doubling of cancer research funding, treatment for every American whose diabetes or heart disease is now going unmanaged and a global immunization campaign to save millions of children’s lives.

Combined, the cost of running those programs for a decade wouldn’t use up even half our money pot. So we could then turn to poverty and education, starting with universal preschool for every 3- and 4-year-old child across the country. The city of New Orleans could also receive a huge increase in reconstruction funds.

The final big chunk of the money could go to national security. The recommendations of the 9/11 Commission that have not been put in place — better baggage and cargo screening, stronger measures against nuclear proliferation — could be enacted. Financing for the war in Afghanistan could be increased to beat back the Taliban’s recent gains, and a peacekeeping force could put a stop to the genocide in Darfur.

All that would be one way to spend $1.2 trillion. Here would be another:

The war in Iraq.

In the days before the war almost five years ago, the Pentagon estimated that it would cost about $50 billion. Democratic staff members in Congress largely agreed. Lawrence Lindsey, a White House economic adviser, was a bit more realistic, predicting that the cost could go as high as $200 billion, but President Bush fired him in part for saying so.

These estimates probably would have turned out to be too optimistic even if the war had gone well. Throughout history, people have typically underestimated the cost of war, as William Nordhaus, a Yale economist, has pointed out.

But the deteriorating situation in Iraq has caused the initial predictions to be off the mark by a scale that is difficult to fathom. The operation itself — the helicopters, the tanks, the fuel needed to run them, the combat pay for enlisted troops, the salaries of reservists and contractors, the rebuilding of Iraq — is costing more than $300 million a day, estimates Scott Wallsten, an economist in Washington.

That translates into a couple of billion dollars a week and, over the full course of the war, an eventual total of $700 billion in direct spending.

The two best-known analyses of the war’s costs agree on this figure, but they diverge from there. Linda Bilmes, at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, and Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel laureate and former Clinton administration adviser, put a total price tag of more than $2 trillion on the war. They include a number of indirect costs, like the economic stimulus that the war funds would have provided if they had been spent in this country.

Mr. Wallsten, who worked with Katrina Kosec, another economist, argues for a figure closer to $1 trillion in today’s dollars. My own estimate falls on the conservative side, largely because it focuses on the actual money that Americans would have been able to spend in the absence of a war. I didn’t even attempt to put a monetary value on the more than 3,000 American deaths in the war.

Besides the direct military spending, I’m including the gas tax that the war has effectively imposed on American families (to the benefit of oil-producing countries like Iran, Russia and Saudi Arabia). At the start of 2003, a barrel of oil was selling for $30. Since then, the average price has been about $50. Attributing even $5 of this difference to the conflict adds another $150 billion to the war’s price tag, Ms. Bilmes and Mr. Stiglitz say.

The war has also guaranteed some big future expenses. Replacing the hardware used in Iraq and otherwise getting the United States military back into its prewar fighting shape could cost $100 billion. And if this war’s veterans receive disability payments and medical care at the same rate as veterans of the first gulf war, their health costs will add up to $250 billion. If the disability rate matches Vietnam’s, the number climbs higher. Either way, Ms. Bilmes says, “It’s like a miniature Medicare.”

In economic terms, you can think of these medical costs as the difference between how productive the soldiers would have been as, say, computer programmers or firefighters and how productive they will be as wounded veterans. In human terms, you can think of soldiers like Jason Poole, a young corporal profiled in The New York Times last year. Before the war, he had planned to be a teacher. After being hit by a roadside bomb in 2004, he spent hundreds of hours learning to walk and talk again, and he now splits his time between a community college and a hospital in Northern California.

Whatever number you use for the war’s total cost, it will tower over costs that normally seem prohibitive. Right now, including everything, the war is costing about $200 billion a year.

Treating heart disease and diabetes, by contrast, would probably cost about $50 billion a year. The remaining 9/11 Commission recommendations — held up in Congress partly because of their cost — might cost somewhat less. Universal preschool would be $35 billion. In Afghanistan, $10 billion could make a real difference. At the National Cancer Institute, annual budget is about $6 billion.

“This war has skewed our thinking about resources,” said Mr. Wallsten, a senior fellow at the Progress and Freedom Foundation, a conservative-leaning research group. “In the context of the war, $20 billion is nothing.”

As it happens, $20 billion is not a bad ballpark estimate for the added cost of Mr. Bush’s planned surge in troops. By itself, of course, that price tag doesn’t mean the surge is a bad idea. If it offers the best chance to stabilize Iraq, then it may well be the right option.

But the standard shouldn’t simply be whether a surge is better than the most popular alternative — a far-less-expensive political strategy that includes getting tough with the Iraqi government. The standard should be whether the surge would be better than the political strategy plus whatever else might be accomplished with the $20 billion.

This time, it would be nice to have that discussion before the troops reach Iraq.

leonhardt@nytimes.com

The Next Phase

It seems that DH and I are about to enter the next phase of our lives. He is ready to retire and I just started a new job a year ago. Actually, that was the plan. I was in school for 4 years prior to taking this job. I got my master's degree and was working on a doctorate when this job opportunity came along that was more attractive to me than 2 more years of school. So, the plan was, when I finished school and got a job, he could retire. Thankfully, for our finances, he does not really want to retire, just step down from his current stressful position, which he finds increasingly distasteful, and get something less demanding (which usually means something less lucrative, as well). So, we spent most of today looking at our finances, figuring our retirement income and talking about various job possibilities for him. It is scary to know how much, and how soon, he would like to leave his current position without knowing what he might do instead. However, he will turn 63 next month and he has been the major contributor to our finances during our marriage, so I whole heartedly support his decision to "downshift." For my part, I better go into work tomorrow with renewed vigor and commitment because it's my turn now to be the major breadwinner (although, if he finds another suitable position, we might not need to touch our retirement savings for another 3 years or so). Well, that's all that's fit to print for today!

Hodge Podge

I have been sinking into a funk since yesterday. Is it a coincidence that this coincides with my attempt to restart my "program?" I don't think so, because the day before I went back on my program, I was already feeling a little blah and edgy (for me, it is possible to feel blah and edgy at the same time). That day, I was eating whatever I wanted and that included a bit of wine and quite a few chocolate cupcakes. However, it was in the mindset of "going on a program tomorrow; better try to satisfy all my cravings now." So, perhaps I am a bit down because I really don't feel like thinking about what I'm going to eat and that I'm getting flabby and should be exercising.

DH and I took some days off of work and every day (which coincides with my program) he has wanted to go out to eat for lunch or breakfast or brunch. This is not like him. I have managed to be moderate in what I am eating despite this. Today after brunch, we went to Trader Joe's and I stocked up on my favorite gazpacho and some frozen cooked shrimp. Thaw out a few of those and toss them in the soup and you have a light, refreshing, and healthy meal (if you can call that a meal and not just an appetizer!). Anyway, enough of that. Certainly I must have something else to talk about.

I also may be a little down because I thought I might take advantage of this time to read a short book about the status of the profession that I am a member of (if it is a profession; there is a bit of controversy about that) and do some thinking and writing about that, but I just haven't felt like it and now tomorrow is Sunday, then Monday and I will be back to the daily grind, not having accomplished anything over the past 5 days. The thing is, doing nothing is really what I feel like doing! Thanks to DH's participation, I have managed to do 20 minutes of exercise for 3 days in a row. That's something!

After thinking he (she?) had left us, we continue to see the turtle around (I guess technically it is a tortoise because it does not have webbed feet and spends most of it's time on land.). DH has decided to name it "Rocket," because he does seem to get around. One minute he's there; the next minute he's not. (Unless he's in the pond from which he must be removed on occasion.) Our poor dogs--Harry and Nutmeg have been very reluctant to go out in the yard for their final pee pees in the evening due to being traumatized by the fireworks on the 4th. To reinforce their fear, there was another fireworks display somewhere nearby tonight for some reason!

What else? Nothing really. So, to make up for a boring, negative post, here are some photos of flowers in our yard this spring, before I was blogging and before this interminable heat and drought set in.






P.S., Poundage today 197.8

What Season Is It?

These are photos of our yard taken today, not last October! I'm very thankful that I do not live in Texas where they are having terrible floods, or in Boise, Idaho where it was supposed to be about 105 today, but it's plenty hot and dry here. These leaves seem to be from one tree--a tulip poplar on which about half of the leaves have turned yellow. We don't know if it is stressed by the lack of rain or if something else is wrong with it. It's a very large tree, which we would hate to lose because it helps sheild us from the neighbor's backyard. We live in a subdivision with houses all around, but because we have some tall, mature trees, we have a nice feeling of privacy from late spring to the middle of fall. DH called a tree service today to see if they had an arborist who could come out and take a look at it. We are still waiting for a return call.


Meanwhile, here is a photo of Harry enjoying the very brief snow we had this past winter. He looks pathetic, but we really didn't make him stay out there! With his hair, he enjoys cold weather. Poor guy; today we took him and Meg to the vet and the car was so hot; I felt so sorry for him. The vet is close so the car was just starting to cool down when we got there. We found out that Meg had gained 10 lbs. since January! She's not fat, but she's not as active as she used to be and she is looking a little thicker through the waist (it happens to all of us!).

"Mom, can I have a fish for dinner? They're supposed to be good for you!"

What to talk about today? First crop of cherry tomatos from the garden yesterday. Harry and Nutmeg go to the vet tomorrow for check-ups and Meg has gotten a bald spot on her leg that needs to be looked at. They were a little uncomfortable with the sounds of fireworks last night. Harry, who's got hip dysplasia and doesn't usually do this kind of thing, got up on the sofa with me and then later on the bed with DH. The turtle is still around. He's been roaming around the yard and taking the occasional dip in the pond. But, what really is on my mind today is weight, mine specifically. It's been going up and up and up since I was about 29, with 2 major weight loss successes mixed in there. I don't want to be as thin as I was in my 20s, but I would like to stabilize at a comfortable and healthy weight. I have never been able to maintain my weight--it's either going up or down, and mostly it's going up. In the spirit of true confessions behind the annonymity of my blog, I am about 5 foot 7 inches and current 199.6 lbs. Which is good, considering I had gotten up to over 200 and that's when I really get uncomfortable. I've decided today is the day I am going back on a "program."

About 7 weeks ago, I got a Jack Lalane juicer. This was inspired by reading about "cleansing juice fasts." I was obviously in some kind of mood the day I ordered it. Anyway, I decided I would try a 3-day juice fast. Well, I quickly found out that just juice had an ill effect on my blood sugar (this is based on how I felt, not any knowlege of a medical problem) and I started thinking, "Hey, isn't fiber supposed to be good for you? Why am I taking the fiber out of my fruits and vegetables?" So, this morphed into an effort to make healthier food choices and generally eat less. This translates into not continuing to eat when I am full, no wine, and no artificial sweets (love sweets; those are my downfall). At that time, I decided not to eat red meat or pork either. Just concentrate on fish and chicken. Well, I was doing pretty well and that is when I dipped down below 200 lbs for the first time in over a year. Then, PMDD hit!! Suddenly, I was out of control, eating a whole large chocolate bar with a bottle of red wine. Polishing off a chocolate cake at work (a half of a cake!), having wine when I got home from work, etc. I had just gotten excited because my clothes were fitting better and I could feel them getting tight again.

Well, the PMDD is over (for a couple of weeks) and I got up the nerve to weigh myself this morning as a precurser to getting on the program again. (A lot of people say forget the scale; what is important is how you feel and how your clothes fit. I've always found that there's a direct correlation between my weight and those things.) Anyway, I was relieved to find that I had not undone all of my previous efforts, having not gone beyond 200 lbs. yet, as stated earlier. So, I am going to renew my efforts and hope to even add a little exercise this time (ugh!). I will not make every post about my weight or "the program," but may put some stats at the end of each post to keep track of my progress and what I ate that day--if I feel like it. So, today I offer you (and me) some photos of my current shape in a dress that I had to buy recently to go to a dressy work affair. I actually wore stockings and high heels! Felt like a stuffed sausage (is there any other kind?). After trying on almost every party dress in the women's department at the store, I opted for this straight dress rather than the others, in which I looked like a linebacker in a tutu. Anyway, it is my hope that the next time I wear a dress, I will not look like a flower covered refrigerator or a line backer in a tutu. I'd like to stop being shocked when I see myself in photos!
Poundage: 199.6

From a Distance

Happy Independence Day. This photo was taken when I was on a trip to D.C. this past March. I am in a somber mood this July 4th. I am feeling the weight of the arrogance of the United States. Before I say anything else, I'm glad I was born in the U.S. and I wouldn't want to live anywhere else (maybe Canada, but I don't really know that much about Canada). I consider myself very fortunate. I grew up in the D.C. area and there is no more moving place to watch fireworks on the 4th of July than standing on the Washington Mall with the Capitol behind you and the Washington Monument in front as the backdrop for the fireworks.

However, when celebrating the "home of the free and the brave" my patriotism is sometimes tempered by thoughts of what we took away from the Native Americans to make this the U.S. and what we try to impose on others. We are really a bullying lot. We take what we want and find a way to justify it later.

Yesterday, I was listening to a Nanci Griffith CD on the way home and she sings a version of "From a Distance." As I sang along, I found myself getting choked up. "From a distance you look like my friend even though we are at war." I have been against invading Iraq since the beginning. I do not believe in forcing our beliefs on other peoples. We are (mostly) happy with our democracy and therefore, we assume others must want it, too. (I know there are a lot of other complex reasons for the war), but the reason we have Independence Day is because a majority of people who settled in the US. wanted independence, wanted a different form of government. That cannot be forced on people and succeed. It has to come from within. People must rise up and demand it. Seems to me in Iraq we went there and said you have a bad leader, we're sure you would want to do things our way. We'll get rid of your leader and then you'll be free to "have it our way." Any surprise it is not working? This is the kind of imposed government that our ancestors fought against. We want the freedom to create the kind of government we want and we're willing to fight and die for it. It just doesn't work if you impose it from the outside. So, I am sad. I believe we have made life worse for millions of Iraqi citizens and there is no chance we can repair the damage we've done. I respect our troops and cherish their belief in doing what their country needs of them, but I hate to see one more person die for a situation that I do not see improving whether we leave tomorrow or 10 years from now. So, Happy 4th of July. Yes; I'm glad to be an American, but look forward to a time when we have wiser leadership and that will only happen when we become wiser ourselves.

Dogs; you've gotta love 'em

I wanted to post a photo of Sandy, a dog in NC that stayed by a missing toddler all night and alerted searchers with a bark. They found the toddler sitting on a tree stump with his faithful companion by his side. However, I couldn't figure out how to post the photo from the newspaper. So, I've decided to use this opportunity to introduce you to our dogs, Nutmeg (Meg) and Harry. Guess which one is Harry and which is Nutmeg! They are both shelter dogs. Harry came to us after the shelter could no longer care for him. That was about 2 years ago. The vet said at the time that he could be anywhere between 4 and 7 years of age. He is clearly part Chow because his tongue is totally black. We went to the shelter and chose Meg about a year later. She was about 6 months at the time. I could tell lots of stories about them, but I need to go to bed now, so more later.