That's a Lotta Pennies

Mark Morford wonders if we spent our $300B in our best interests (snippet):

....Let's just say it outright: The ends do not justify the means. A barely democratic Iraq is fine and good, but you well know that if Bush had mumbled to the nation three years and $300 billion ago that we were going to start bombing this piss-poor country back to the stone age and gut the U.S. economy and put thousands of American soldiers and tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis in death's way to deliver it, all while sending the nastiest possible message to the world and actually increasing the threat of terrorism while turning our backs on every major U.S. ally, I doubt many Americans would have giddily waved the flag of support (except maybe Ann Coulter, who apparently loves anything involving guns and dead foreigners). Let's put it another way: Here is your choice, America: $300 billion and massive international disrespect and a huge pile of dead American soldiers in an effort to force a fragile democracy onto a torn and fractured Iraq by ousting their useless dictator who was, let us repeat, no threat to us, or to anyone, and who was, in fact, our ally, until he dared to threaten our oil. Or: $300 billion to assist struggling nations and battle AIDS and protect the planet, to evolve our international relationships and set up treaties and unifying alliances and maybe even have a little left over to help fix our own schools, maybe help all those destitute American city upgrade their hospitals and fix their homeless problems and even maybe launch a national health care plan, spend that money on trying to solve a huge host of social ills plaguing this crumbling beautiful egomaniacal empire we call home....

I'll go with the "Or".