Binghamton NY Mayor to Put 'Cost of War' Sign on City Hall

[Elmore Furth]

The Congressional Research Service says that the direct costs of war now reach $1.08 trillion, including $748 billion for Iraq, $340 billion for Afghanistan and $29 billion for "enhanced security."

http://www.sdnn.com/sandiego/2010-04-15/blog/a-more-perfect-union/emblem-time-to-rethink-the-cost-of-wars

Joseph Stieglitz puts the estimate conservatively at $3 trillion

http://historyphilosophybooks.suite101.com/article.cfm/joseph-stiglitz-the-three-trillion-dollar-war-book-review.

I guess we all get to pay for the Bush-Cheney-Wolfowitz Neocon view of the world.

An upstate New York mayor has announced plans to hang an electronic sign outside City Hall displaying the ongoing taxpayer cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Binghamton Mayor Matthew Ryan, a Democrat, says he hopes tallying the ongoing expense in a prominent place will help stimulate a debate on the nation's spending priorities.

The mayor says the 4-foot-wide ''cost of war'' sign will display information about the cost to local, state and federal taxpayers. The $6,000 sign is being paid for by the Broome County Cost of War Project, a local peace activist group.

NY Mayor to Put 'Cost of War' Sign on City Hall