The Cost of The War By Pascal Riche From: Foreign Affairs Nobel Laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz and Harvard budget expert Linda Bilmes plan to present this week a paper estimating the cost of the Iraq War at between $1-2 trillion. This is far higher than earlier estimates of $100-200 billion. Here is their statement:
A new study by two leading academic experts suggests that the costs of the Iraq war will be substantially higher than previously reckoned. In a paper presented to this week's Allied Social Sciences Association annual meeting in Boston MA., Harvard budget expert Linda Bilmes and Columbia University Professor and Nobel Laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz calculate that the war is likely to cost the United States a minimum of nearly one trillion dollars and potentially over $2 trillion. The study expands on traditional budgetary estimates by including costs such as lifetime disability and health care for the over 16,000 injured, one fifth of whom have serious brain or spinal injuries. It then goes on to analyze the costs to the economy, including the economic value of lives lost and the impact of factors such as higher oil prices that can be partly attributed to the conflict in Iraq. The paper also calculates the impact on the economy if a proportion of the money spent on the Iraq war were spent in other ways, including on investments in the United States "Shortly before the war, when Administration economist Larry Lindsey suggested that the costs might range between $100 and $200 billion, Administration spokesmen quickly distanced themselves from those numbers," points out Professor Stiglitz. "But in retrospect, it appears that Lindsey's numbers represented a gross underestimate of the actual costs." The Allied Social Sciences Association meeting is attended by the nation's leading economists and social scientists. It is sponsored jointly by the American Economic Association and the Economists for Peace and Security. http://www.tpmcafe.com/story/2006/1/5/11510/30624 *** http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/08/opinion/08sun1.html?th&emc=th Judging Samuel Alito NY Times Lead Editorial: Sunday, January 8, 2006 Judicial nominations are not always motivated by ideology, but the nomination of Judge Samuel Alito certainly was. President Bush's previous choice to fill Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's seat on the Supreme Court, Harriet Miers, was hounded into withdrawing by the far right, primarily because she appeared to hold moderate views on a variety of legal issues. President Bush placated Ms. Miers's conservative critics by nominating Judge Alito, who has long been one of their favorites. Judge Alito's confirmation hearings begin tomorrow. He may be able to use them to reassure the Senate that he will be respectful of rights that Americans cherish, but he has a lengthy and often troubling record he will have to explain away. As a government lawyer, he worked to overturn Roe v. Wade. He has disturbing beliefs on presidential power - a critical issue for the country right now. He has worked to sharply curtail Congress's power to pass laws and protect Americans. He may not even believe in "one person one vote." The White House has tried to create an air of inevitability around Judge Alito's confirmation. But the public is skeptical. In a new Harris poll, just 34 percent of those surveyed said they thought he should be confirmed, while 31 percent said he should not, and 34 percent were unsure. Nearly 70 percent said they would oppose Judge Alito's nomination if they thought he would vote to make abortion illegal - which it appears he might well do. If President Bush had chosen a pragmatic, mainstream conservative like Justice O'Connor to fill the seat, these confirmation hearings would be a breeze. But now, the Senate has a duty to delve into the many areas in which Judge Alito's record suggests he is an extremist, including: ABORTION Judge Alito has not only opposed Roe v. Wade, he has also worked to overturn it. When he applied for a promotion in the Reagan administration in 1985, he wrote that he was "particularly proud" of his legal arguments "that the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion." In meetings with senators, Judge Alito has talked about his respect for Roe, but he has said nothing to discourage his supporters on the religious right who back him because they believe he will vote to overturn it. The American people have a right to know, unambiguously, where Judge Alito stands on Roe. PRESIDENTIAL POWER The continuing domestic wiretapping scandal shows that the Bush administration has a dangerous view of its own powers, and the Supreme Court is the most important check on such excesses. But Judge Alito has some disturbing views about handing the president even more power. He has argued that courts interpreting statutes should consider the president's intent when he signed the law to be just as important as Congress's intent in writing and passing the law. It is a radical suggestion that indicates he has an imperial view of presidential power. CONGRESSIONAL POWER While Judge Alito seems intent on expanding the president's power, he has called for sharply reducing the power of Congress. In United States v. Rybar, he wrote a now-infamous dissent arguing that Congress exceeded its power in passing a law that banned machine guns. As a Reagan administration lawyer, he argued that Congress did not have the power to pass the Truth in Mileage Act to protect consumers from odometer fraud. ONE PERSON ONE VOTE Judge Alito said in his 1985 application that he had become interested in constitutional law as a student partly because of his opposition to the Warren court's reapportionment rulings, which created the "one person one vote" standard. He seems to still have believed as a 35-year-old lawyer that these cases, which made legislative districts much more fair, came out the wrong way. There are other areas - including civil rights, sex discrimination, the environment and criminal law - where Judge Alito's record appears extreme. The Senate should question him closely on all of them. The Senate should also explore Judge Alito's honesty. According to a senator he met with, he tried to dismiss his statement about the Constitution's not protecting abortion as merely part of a job application, which suggests he will bend the truth when it suits his purposes. Judge Alito has said he does not recall being in an ultraconservative group called Concerned Alumni of Princeton, which opposed co-education and affirmative action. That is odd, since he boasted of his membership in that same 1985 job application. The tortuous history of his promise to Congress to recuse himself in cases involving the Vanguard companies, which he ultimately failed to do, should also be explored. Judge Alito's nomination is often presented as an abortion rights showdown, but it is much more than that. Those who care about the broad range of rights and liberties that Americans now have, and about honesty in government, should tune into the hearings starting tomorrow - and call their senators with their reactions to what they hear. *** New Alito Opposition Efforts Launched Civil Rights organizations, and Women's Groups * New Alito Opposition Efforts Launched By civilrights.org staff civilrights.org January 4, 2006 http://www.civilrights.org/issues/nominations/details.cfm?id=39149 With Samuel Alito's confirmation hearings scheduled to begin next week, groups opposed to President Bush's nominee to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court are stepping up their efforts to inform the public about Alito's record. IndependentCourt.org, a coalition of public interest organizations, launched a new 30-second television spot Wednesday focusing on the fact that as a federal judge, Alito has more than once broken promises he made to the Senate Judiciary Committee during his first confirmation process, giving several different excuses for his conduct once the broken pledge was revealed. When nominated to a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, Alito said that he would not rule in cases involving two companies that handled his investments or in cases involving his sister's law firm. The ad points out, however, that court records show Alito's participation in such cases, despite his pledge to recuse himself. The ad, which will run initially on cable news programs nationally and in Maine and Arkansas, asks: "Shouldn't we be able to trust Supreme Court nominees to keep their word? In addition to the television ad buy, IndependentCourt.org will also begin running radio advertisements in Arkansas and Louisiana highlighting Alito's troubling record on civil rights. The radio ads will be unveiled at a press conference in Arkansas Wednesday. "We need the Supreme Court to reject employment discrimination, to stand up against government and big business intrusions on our rights and privacy, to uphold the democratic principle of one person - one vote," said Wade Henderson, executive director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. "Americans need to understand why so many people are asking whether Alito can be counted on to stand up for us." IndependentCourt.org also announced Wednesday that it will kick-off two weeks of nationwide grassroots activity by delivering approximately one million anti- Alito petitions to Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Arlen Specter's Philadelphia office on Thursday, January 5. Pennsylvanians for a Fair and Independent Court will be joined at the Philadelphia event by Julian Bond, NAACP chairman of the board and Karen Pearl, interim president, Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Coalition affiliate networks in Arkansas, Connecticut, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Maine, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island, Texas, and Wisconsin will be hosting their own petition delivery events to urge their senators to oppose Samuel Alito's nomination. ========== * Women's Groups Launch Campaign Against Alito Nomination by Haider Rizvi OneWorld US - Jan. 5, 2006 http://us.oneworld.net/article/view/125126/1/ NEW YORK, Jan 4 (OneWorld) - Leading women's rights groups in the United States are starting a nationwide campaign this week to block the Supreme Court nomination of a conservative judge who is known for his extremist views on women's reproductive rights. Samuel Alito, 56, was nominated by President George W. Bush after Justice Sandra Day O'Connor retired last year in July. His confirmation hearing in the U.S. Senate is expected this month. "Make no mistake about it. Alito is no Sandra Day O'Connor," says Eleanor Smeal, president of the Washington, D.C.-based Feminist Majority Foundation, which has organized the campaign in collaboration with the National Organization for Women (NOW) and National Congress of Black Women (NCBW). As the first-ever female to sit on the Supreme Court, O'Connor cast the decisive fifth vote on the nine- member panel to preserve affirmative action and the right to abortion. Smeal and others fear that replacing O'Connor with Alito could tip the court's balance on many issues concerning women's human rights, including the right to abortion. "It will take us back to the days when sexual harassment and discrimination was all in a day's work for women," says NOW's Lisa Bennet. "It will take us back when illegal, unsafe abortions were the norm." In addition to sending letters to their representatives in the U.S. Senate, thousands of volunteers are preparing to join others in Washington to protest Alito's nomination, according to organizers. "When women know what is at stake, they are appalled," says Bennet. "They are not willing to give up the advances of the past 40 years." The three organizations are also enlisting students from around the country to take part in the rallies and meetings due to be held in Washington in the coming days. "Young people are coming to Washington, D.C. from colleges and universities in 35 states, giving up their winter vacations because they don't want to lose rights necessary for modern life." Judge Alito, who has written some 700 opinions, ruled in the 1991 case of Planned Parenthood vs. Casey that a Pennsylvania state law could require married women seeking an abortion to inform their husbands. But the U.S. Supreme Court reversed that verdict by a majority vote. Last month, the Associated Press uncovered a 1995 memo written by Alito arguing that the 1973 Supreme Court decision on Roe vs. Wade should be overturned. Roe vs. Wade was a landmark case establishing that laws against abortion violate the constitutional right to privacy. The decision outlawed all state laws banning or restricting abortion. Unhappy with the ruling, many right-wing religious groups have since tried hard to see it reversed. Many conservatives now seem more than pleased with Bush's decision to choose Alito for O'Connor's position. "No one can argue that Judge Alito is anything but extremely well qualified for the court and his unanimous confirmation to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals will undermine any attempt by liberals to argue that he is an ideologue," says Progress for America, a conservative group supporting Alito's nomination. As the controversy surrounding Alito's nomination begins to flare up the nationwide debate, some politicians on Capitol Hill are calling for calm. "I would hope that people on both sides hold their fire," said senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) recently, "allow the Judiciary Committee to do its work, and not take a position until that work is completed." Feinstein voted against John Roberts, another conservative judge, when he was nominated by Bush as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. As Feinstein and other lawmakers discuss Alito's nomination inside the U.S. Capitol, outside, activists like Bennet say they are determined not to turn back the clock. "Bush has given in to the extremists' demands," she says, "but the Senate doesn't have to go along." "That's the message from women, especially young women," she adds. "This is a fight for our future and we are ready." 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