A chart you won't see on Fox News today
September 01, 2010 12:36 pm ET by Jeremy Holden & Shauna Theel
Fox & Friends distorted data to deceptively compare the cost of the Iraq war and the cost of the stimulus bill, citing outdated stimulus estimates and pretending that the U.S. will not spend any additional money related to the Iraq war after 2010.
After Fox & Friend Brian Kilmeade said he was "stunned" that Obama said the Iraq war contributed to deficits, Fox & Friend Gretchen Carlson said, "Look at the difference in the spending between Iraq, a $709 billion, versus the stimulus of $862 billion." While Carlson spoke Fox & Friends showed graphically the "difference in the spending":
Carlson promised: "You're not going to see this graph too many other places today. Trust me."
Carlson is likely right, but not for the reasons she thinks.
The reason you're not going to see this graph anywhere else is that this graph is completely dishonest.
According to the Congressional Budget Office, the cost of operations for the Iraq war through 2010 is $709 billion. But the costs associated with the Iraq war do not end there. As Obama discussed in his Oval Office address:
Going forward, a transitional force of U.S. troops will remain in Iraq with a different mission: advising and assisting Iraq's Security Forces, supporting Iraqi troops in targeted counterterrorism missions, and protecting our civilians. Consistent with our agreement with the Iraqi government, all U.S. troops will leave by the end of next year. As our military draws down, our dedicated civilians -- diplomats, aid workers, and advisors -- are moving into the lead to support Iraq as it strengthens its government, resolves political disputes, resettles those displaced by war, and builds ties with the region and the world. That's a message that Vice President Biden is delivering to the Iraqi people through his visit there today.
In October 2009, CBO estimated that continued operations would add $156 billion to the deficit between 2010 and 2014.
The dishonesty is amplified by Fox & Friends' cherry picking cost estimates of the stimulus bill. In its January economic outlook, the CBO revised its estimate of the stimulus cost to $862 billion. But in August, CBO took into account changes to the law and said the stimulus would cost $814 billion.
Taking into account reality, a chart comparing CBO estimates of the costs associated with the stimulus and with the Iraq war would look markedly different:
You're probably not going to see that chart on Fox News anytime soon.
Incidentally, the consensus among economists is that GDP and employment are both higher today than they would have been without the stimulus -- not that Fox will tell you that.
If Fox thinks spinning the numbers to make the red bar slightly smaller makes the Iraq war seem better than the stimulus, they're not just lying, they're out of touch with reality.
I think that you meant GDP is higher and unemployment is lower. Could be wrong, but I think that's what you meant.
They(Fox) didn't even address the realities of the ongoing war expenditures,or the wasted billions on projects never completed,questionable no-bid contracts to Halliburton,contracts for disastrous Blackwater activities, or billions of unaccounted for spending.Yet they will trumpet over and over about a small amount of stimulus money spent on something like paving the Sunset Strip!!
Where or when did the President take credit for anything except carefully ending the Iraq war as he said he would.Any assessment of real Iraq success is a future proposition against the final cost years from now!!
Over a trillion for both wars.
Also, with the stim, there was money we got back from the money that was sent out (banks, Big 3, and so on), plus, not ALL of the stim money was spent.
Their chart, is of course, fanciful, and wrong.
Which is a lot more than the cost of the stimulus jobs.
And does it include all the equipment, vehicles and weapons that were run ragged during the war and will now have to be replaced?
And does it include the cost to build/maintain our monolithic embassy that we've built in Baghdad?
That number has to be higher.
So... to be fair, the Fox numbers should be represented as something like this:
Costs through 2010.
Iraq - $709B
Stimulus tax cuts - $300B
Stimulus spending - $300B
Giant snowballs will form in Hades before we ever see that on Fox, if for no reason other than the fact that most pseudo-Conservatives (which is most modern CONs) will never admit that a tax cuts actually costs something and adds to the deficit. Admitting that simple fact is a heresy that will earn the RINO label faster than Fox can rightwing-load a discussion panel...
I would suggest one other clarification: $212 billion in Stimulus Plan is tax cuts to 95% of working Americans and businesses.
I don't know about FauxNoise staff, but I didn't get squat from Iraq and don't hold stock or mutual fund in any company that did.
Stimulating the economy when we would have entered a second Great Depression otherwise is necessary spending.
Waging a totally unnecessary and ill-advised war, after the President learned in early 2003 that the intelligence he'd been relying upon was wrong and that Saddam didn't really have any WMD's? Totally unncessary spending.
Comparing the two is an unfair comparison in every possible way, including that the numbers they used are a big distortion of the current info we have. If we're going to look at the eventual costs of the stimulus, then we need to look at the eventual costs of the Iraq War!
If the height of the column on the left represents 709 billion, then the height of the column on the right rerpresents about 975 billion! Will these guys stop at nothing in their efforts to distort and mislead?
No.