What Portland pays for the Iraq War

What is the estimated cost of the Iraq war to Portlanders in the 2008 fiscal year?

Take a guess:

a) $900,000
b) $10 million
c) $100 million
d) $190 million

To find the answer, go here, to the National Priorities Project web site.

Take that number and divide it by 600,000 Portlanders and you will get the average cost for each man, woman and child in the city — for one year. Of course, we have been in Iraq five years...and counting.

Another way to use the National Priorities Project site is to go to its "trade-offs" section. It will tell you, for instance, that the Fiscal Year 2007 US expenditures in Iraq would have provided 158,000 homes in Portland with renewable energy. Several other "trade-off"s are listed such as numbers of teachers and health care coverage.

I learned of the link to the National Priorities Project web site from the Friends Committee on National Legislation. FCNL's own site notes that 43 percent of your federal taxes will go to the military. Compare to the 3 percent that goes to education and jobs and the 1 percent that goes to diplomacy and foreign aid.

Did someone mention change?