Count the Cost of (Lack of) Freedom

Brian Doherty | January 17, 2006

Britain's House of Lords does one good for us peasants everywhere, with a demand that the British home secretary give a detailed report to parliament on how much its proposed I.D. card scheme will cost--and, no, really, how much it will actually cost. A wonderful principle, and if applied across the board to democratic governments everywhere, one that could prevent all sorts of mischief. For example, how many Americans, congressman or layman, really think Iraq is worth $2 trillion?

Comments

|1.17.06 @ 4:05PM|#

This is good, but I'd feel better if they opposed it as a matter of principle, not as a matter of cost. Especially since, even if it is deemed "too expensive" right now, technology will soon bring the price down.

|1.17.06 @ 4:18PM|#

Welcome back, Brian.

|1.17.06 @ 4:23PM|#

This is good, but I'd feel better if they opposed it as a matter of principle, not as a matter of cost.

Remember, only crazy wingnut libertarians think of it in such radical terms as principle.

|1.17.06 @ 4:43PM|#

Anachronistic and reactionary as they may be, heriditary Lords have long been the only effective check on the 'elected dictatorship' of British government, given that MPs have all the independence of sheep.

|1.17.06 @ 4:52PM|#

Semi-related to this line:

"and, no, really, how much it will actually cost."

I was reading about how the ruling Liberal party in Canada is about to get tossed out in the election this month. One of the things the Liberals can take credit for is implementing a gun registration/confiscation scheme. Originally they said it would cost about $50 million. To date the cost is around $2 billion. Any more than that and we're talking real money.

|1.17.06 @ 5:49PM|#

Its a little hard to understand how it could possibly cost $67,000 per every man, woman, and child in Iraq (30 million, total), to establish the beginnings of a sustainable, democratic government. I thought the guberment quit buying the $500 toilet seats in the 1980's.

|1.17.06 @ 6:10PM|#

For example, how many Americans, congressman or layman, really think Iraq is worth $2 trillion?

Those who think the choice is between a post-nuclear caliphate and insert blank think Iraq is worth $2 trillion, the Bill of Rights, and--I dunno--thousands of dead Iraqi civilians and thousands of dead and wounded American soldiers. ...hell, a lot of 'em see that as just the ante!

Wasn't it Mencken who said, "No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American people."?

Pardon me, I just finished reading some of the comments in the "The New York Times Wrong Again" thread. It'll take a while, but I'll find my way to optimism again. ...maybe by sometime tomorrow.

P.S. Nice to see Doherty alive and posting!

|1.17.06 @ 7:15PM|#

For example, how many Americans, congressman or layman, really think Iraq is worth $2 trillion?


Wow, if only life were as simple as most Reasonoids think it to be. Of course, we will never know the amount of money and lives it would have cost to continue to contain Saddam and if that would have been effective and how much money and lives would have been spent as a result of that, so its a little harder to make the comparison than Brian makes us believe. By just throwing out the $2 trillion figure, Brian makes it look like the choice was between invading Iraq or doing nothing and spending nothing and living in peace. Of course there was no such choice, we had been spending billions of dollars containing Saddam and putting a burr up every Muslim's ass by stationing troops in the Holy land for ten years and there was no end in sight to that operation. But hey, it makes people like Jennifer and Joe feel better about themselves, so I guess its not all for naught.

Looked at another way, if say five years from now the Mullahs act on their word and nuke Israel and a couple of cities in Europe and we spend $10 or $20 trillion and a tens of thousands of lives stopping them, getting rid of them for say $3 trillion will look like a good deal forgone. Of course, if we were actually to do that, we would never know for sure that the Mullahs were going to act on their threats and we would have people like Brian here to ask us whether getting rid of the Mullahs in Iran was really worth $3 trillion dollars.

|1.17.06 @ 8:00PM|#

getting rid of them for say $3 trillion will look like a good deal forgone.

I still don't see how. Isn't the entire United States budget something like $1.8 trillion dollars per year? How is spending 2 year's worth of every cent raised in this, the richest country on earth, ever going to be a good deal? A "good deal" would be if we had paid Saddam's chef $10,000 to serve him some moldy falafel to kill him. You get the end result, without the expensive chaos!

heriditary Lords have long been the only effective check on the 'elected dictatorship' of British government,

Most parliamentary Lords are not hereditary, and have not been since 1988. Most are Life Peers, appointed due to merit or achievement in business, education, science, etc. and selected by cronies in the Commons (Lord Saatchi or the Tories comes to mind). They generally can be independent, and at least have to have some verifiable accomplishments besides fundraising and hiring political operators.

|1.17.06 @ 8:35PM|#

Wow, if only life were as simple as most Reasonoids think it to be.

Funny, it always seemed to me that we libertarians had a more complex worldview; indeed, it always seemed to me that this complexity was at the heart of why we came to the conclusions we did.

...That having been said, some questions are simple.

Of course, we will never know the amount of money and lives it would have cost to continue to contain Saddam and if that would have been effective and how much money and lives would have been spent as a result of that, so its a little harder to make the comparison than Brian makes us believe.

...Take Doherty's question, for instance:

For example, how many Americans, congressman or layman, really think Iraq is worth $2 trillion?

You think Americans incapable of answering the question of whether they think Iraq was worth it?

...and here I thought I was being petulant!

By just throwing out the $2 trillion figure, Brian makes it look like the choice was between invading Iraq or doing nothing and spending nothing and living in peace.

The choice Doherty threw out there to Americans was whether or not they thought Iraq was worth it.

...Doherty's a real live person, and he wrote something. We can all see it above. What Doherty wrote and what you, apparently, want him to have written are two different things.

Of course there was no such choice, we had been spending billions of dollars containing Saddam and putting a burr up every Muslim's ass by stationing troops in the Holy land for ten years and there was no end in sight to that operation.

I suppose this could be an interesting point, but it would have been better prefaced by something relevant to what Doherty had actually written. You might have been better served taking a irrelevant pot shot at some regular commenters or something.

But hey, it makes people like Jennifer and Joe feel better about themselves, so I guess its not all for naught.

...On second thought, I take it back. As bad as it was, you were better off with the first tack.

Looked at another way, if say five years from now the Mullahs act on their word and nuke Israel and a couple of cities in Europe and we spend $10 or $20 trillion and a tens of thousands of lives stopping them, getting rid of them for say $3 trillion will look like a good deal forgone.

Speaking of false dichotomies! ...please see my first comment above.

(aside) Some of you thought I was kidding with that comment, didn't you? (/aside)

Of course, if we were actually to do that, we would never know for sure that the Mullahs were going to act on their threats and we would have people like Brian here to ask us whether getting rid of the Mullahs in Iran was really worth $3 trillion dollars.

It is a false choice--why can't the same be said for the other side of the coin?

|1.17.06 @ 8:55PM|#

Ken,

Brian was asking a rethorical question. The point was not what people actually think of the $2 trillion figure, the point was that it was obviously not worth that amount of money. Otherwise, what point could he possibly be making, that people really do have opinions?

|1.17.06 @ 8:55PM|#

In case I didn't make myself abundantly clear above, the belief that Doherty wrote something suggesting that avoiding a nuclear holocaust isn't worth $2 trillion is an absolute, unmitigated howler.

If you've immersed yourself in propaganda to the extent that you can't read what Doherty wrote without thinking that that's what he was saying, then you should seriously consider talking to this guy.

|1.17.06 @ 8:56PM|#

Ken,

My point is that it is a very complex question and that the answer indeed maybe yes. It certainly would be yes if we knew for sure that Saddam was going to cause enough trouble in the future. The point is that it is not so simple as to throw out pithy rethorical questions.

|1.17.06 @ 8:57PM|#

hope the House of Lords never becomes an elected body...

|1.17.06 @ 9:00PM|#

Ken,

In case I did not make myself abundently clear, I never implied or said that that was what Brian was saying. My point was he threw out a figure as evidence that invading Iraq was not worth it without any consideration of the alternative or the possibility that it may have in fact prevented some very expensive possibilities. That is sloppy thought and a simplistic way of looking at things.

|1.17.06 @ 9:36PM|#

It all depends, of course, on what what one supposes two trillion is buying, or more accurately, helping the U.S. taxpayer avoid. I tend to think that if the populations of the Persian Gulf do not become governed by consent fairly quickly, including control of their oil reserves, and the distribution of the currency that the reserves are traded for, there is a reasonably good chance that a few tens of millions of people, to state a figure in the middle range, will be slaughtered in that region by the United States, or whatever other oil-consuming, militarily powerful, population which becomes the target of the sort of people who think killing scads of oil-consuming infidels will serve Allah. I tend to think it is worth two trillion to avoid killing two or three million people, to say nothing of twenty or thirty million people.

Of course, one can reasonably argue that the actions in Iraq will be ineffectual in avoiding that outcome, but that isn't a question about the value of two trillion dollars, but rather whether the actions in Iraq are worthwhile at any price.

|1.17.06 @ 9:38PM|#

"Looked at another way, if say five years from now the Mullahs act on their word and nuke Israel and a couple of cities in Europe and we spend $10 or $20 trillion and a tens of thousands of lives stopping them, getting rid of them for say $3 trillion will look like a good deal forgone. Of course, if we were actually to do that, we would never know for sure that the Mullahs were going to act on their threats and we would have people like Brian here to ask us whether getting rid of the Mullahs in Iran was really worth $3 trillion dollars."

And none of the above will ever happen, because instead of dealing with the fundamentalist regime in Iran (or N. Korea), we decided to invade the ineffectual and already contained regime next door. But thanks for pointing out another cost of the war on Iraq -- the opportunity cost represented by Iran. All the saber rattling in the world won�t deter the Mullahs now; they know and Bush knows that we�re spent. It also doesn�t take a genius to notice that the balance of power in that region have shifted irrevocably towards Iran after the war in Iraq. The price tag is high indeed!

|1.17.06 @ 10:11PM|#

I was against the war going in, but if it works out, I think it's probably worth 50 trillion dollars. And by "works", I mean if it ends up leading to democratizing the middle east. So that's a big "if", but yeah...

|1.17.06 @ 10:54PM|#

In case I did not make myself abundently clear, I never implied or said that that was what Brian was saying.

Pardom me then. I thought you were referring to Doherty's post, where he wrote:

"For example, how many Americans, congressman or layman, really think Iraq is worth $2 trillion?"

My point was he threw out a figure as evidence that invading Iraq was not worth it without any consideration of the alternative or the possibility that it may have in fact prevented some very expensive possibilities.

You can continue to project your pet meme on Doherty's post, and you can continue to fault his post for not buying into your false dichotomy. You cannot, however, stop me from pointing and laughing.

That is sloppy thought and a simplistic way of looking at things.

Asking how many Americans think Iraq was worth the cost is "simplistic"? It's a simple question!

Asking how many Americans think Iraq was worth the cost is "sloppy thought"? If I asked how many Americans, considering the cost, want universal health care anyway, would that be sloppy thought?

You know what's sloppy? ...when someone caricatures a notorious fallacy at the top of a thread, and then some other oblivious individual apes that caricature to beat the band. You know what's sloppy? ...wrongly accusing someone of presenting a false choice, and then faulting him for not buying into a false choice as evidence!

|1.17.06 @ 10:59PM|#

ChrisM:

If the US should have dealt with Iran or North Korea instead of toppling the Iraqi Baathist regime, what would have "dealing" with them entailed? And would you (or anyone else here) be any happier with the result?

|1.17.06 @ 11:10PM|#

Chris, please review a topographical map of the nations surrounding the Persian Gulf, and the larger area surrounding them, and then propose specifically how to "deal" with the regime in Iran, that goes beyond asking "pretty please" to some thugs who know that there will always be enough actors who will buy the oil needed to keep them in power, no matter what economic sanctions are instituted. If large, easily extracted, oil reserves were located in South Africa, apartheid would still exist, absent an invasion by an outside entity.

If military action is taken against Iran, short of something involving mushroom clouds, the fact that we have a large presence in Iraq, no matter how thinly stretched, is going to be an advantage. Study some geography.

|1.17.06 @ 11:17PM|#

I can't help but think that there must be ways of avoiding WMD attacks that cost less than $2 trillion.

For instance, a few assassinations of Middle Eastern leaders, coupled with handguns and ammo for every Arab woman. And heavy bombing of nuclear research facilities. Plus tenured professorships in the US for the Middle East's leading nuclear physicists and microbiologists. (We can evacuate them before we bomb their old labs.)

I'm not saying these are the ideal policies for the US to follow. But if you want some ideas that are no crazier than invading Iraq and yet cost significantly less, well, there you go.

|1.17.06 @ 11:46PM|#

throeau, unless the despots who control the oil reserves are physically removed, and repaced by the populations being governed by consent, the spectre of titanic slaughter in the Persian Gulf remains a likely outcome. Assasinating Hussein and his sons simply would have meant another member of the Baathist mafia would have held power for decades. Trying to funnel arms to people who are unprepared and untrained to use them in a way that serves our interests is a waste of time. The Pakistani scientist who developed the Islamic bomb was motivated ideologically. If a lab is buried deep enough, we can't bomb it, short of using nukes. The fact of the matter is that trying to keep technological knowledge from people who are heavily motivated, and have adequate wealth, is very seldom successful. Any nutjob/dictator with a lot of dough who really wants a nuclear weapon is likely going to get one, and the only solution is to get rid of that style of government, at least in any place that has more resources than the most poverty-stricken places on earth, and even that qualification may not apply. I mean, if the poverty case which is North Korea can obtain the technology, can it really be beyond the reach of many actors who are so motivated?

|1.18.06 @ 1:27AM|#

What if the the population consents to waging nuclear war on their enemies? Is it OK, then?

Democracy has always been a crapshoot. Sometimes you get Pericles, sometimes Alcibiades.

Sandy|1.18.06 @ 2:13AM|#

So all we have to do is learn how to build democracies out of one-resource economies with societies with lots of tribal characteristics left in them and ensure that they won't collapse into dictatorship a la the Weimar Republic, and the way to do this is to invade them all.

Well, hell, if only someone had just explained that to me, I never would have objected to ending the hunt for Osama bin Laden to go after a country with no WMD programs.

|1.18.06 @ 2:53AM|#

No, Apostate, if they express that desire, and attempt to act on it, then they will be ruthlessly and absolutely annihilated, in a bloodbath which may exceed that of WWII, although much more one-sided. Before that event occurs, however, it would be preferable to expend a great deal of wealth in an effort to determine that this is the path they wish to pursue. Titanic slaughter has very, very, ill effects on the slaughterer, no matter that it is worse for the slaughtered.

Hey, Sandy, the situation sucks through and through, and has for many, many, years, without us recognizing it. Lamenting the fact that it sucks, however, doesn't mitigate the need to engage it, no matter that there is no strategy available which is not fraught with peril. Osama Bin Laden could have died of a stroke on September 12, 2001, and the strategic situation would have changed very little, because he is simply a symptom, not the disease itself.

Until the populations of the Persian Gulf control their oil, and are trading with it peacefully and profitably with the rest of the world, there will be more from where he came from. The oil will be extracted, because the population of the rest of the world demands it. The only open question is how many corpses are stacked in the process.

|1.18.06 @ 9:16AM|#

Will Allen,

"Dealing" with Iran may indeed involve the threat of military action, and an execution of that threat if necessary. And no, having a thinly stretched out army in Iraq is worse than useless. I appreciate your subtle (and selective) grasp of Iranian geography, but unlike you, I can't ignore their ample and accessible coast, or their shared borders with Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Turkey, and Azerbaijan. Iraq isn't the only or best way into Iran -- nice try.

I'm glad you have a good imagination -- with your mushroom clouds, parallel universe South Africas, and single bordered Iran -- but here in the real world, the American president can do little else than huff an puff about Iran. We're spread thin, and we've spent all of our good will on cheap whores (Iraq). Dealing with Iran might have just involved a threat, explicit or implicit. It simply can't be rationally denied that the Iraqi war has emboldened and empowered the Mullahs next door.

|1.18.06 @ 9:55AM|#

cdunlea wrote, "Isn't the entire United States budget something like $1.8 trillion dollars per year? "


I believe that the US budget estimated income for 2006 is about 2.6 trillion.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2005/pdf/hist.pdf

This&That

|1.18.06 @ 9:55AM|#

ChrisM., perhaps you should familiarize yourself the the geographical feature known as "mountain ranges", which have had some influence on military action in the past, and while your are at it, you may wish to review the odds of gaining cooperation with Turkey or Pakistan regarding an attack on Iran. Or perhaps you envisioned fighting throught those two countries. Nice try.

Finally, your sarcastic dismissal of examination previous efforts to use economic pressure on recalcitrant actors, and how differences between those situations and the one we face now may inform us of our odds of success, leads one to believe that you really don't wish to think about this matter, but merely to shake your fist. Congratulations.

|1.18.06 @ 11:06AM|#

I might add that anyone who thinks that the sanctions regime in place prior to invasion, which was what prevented Hussein from taking up once again the efforts that Iran is now pursuing, was sustainable, is deluding himself.

I'd still like to here some detailed proposals as how to "deal" with an oil-rich despotic regime which endeavors to obtain nuclear weapons, and is openly stating it's intentions to use them.

amazingdrx|1.18.06 @ 11:56AM|#

That 2 trillion adds a dollar a gallon to the price of fuel over the bext 20 years in hidden costs to taxpayers.

And since it is borrowed money add another buck for interst.

The cost of the electrical equivalent to a gallon of fuel is one dollar, at 10 cents per kwh.

Love those free markets, hehey. We the people are free to go bankrupt.

How much will the Iran and Pakistan wars cost? Another 20 trillion?

Hand the presidency to jeb bush you all. Neeehaaaaw.

|1.19.06 @ 12:30AM|#

John defends the Iraq war against Brian's to the point question with all the logic and sense of a Democrat defending a public works program.

By just throwing out the $2 trillion figure

Not just "thrown out". That's a projection based on extrapolation. Just the cost so far in dollars and lives has been tragic and needless.

John's last paragraph in his 7:15 comment is a silly fantasy that does nothing toward justifying our government's shameful attack on Iraq.