Marty Durlin

Online Editor

Are we so jaded, dulled and/or distracted that there’s no no uproar about VP Dick Cheney’s latest arrogant dismissal of American citizens? In a March 19 interview with ABC’s Martha Raddatz, in response to a reminder that two-thirds of the American public oppose the war in Iraq, Cheney replied, “So?”

So? So? So 4000 U.S. soldiers have died, 97 percent of them since President George W. Bush declared major combat ended. Wyoming, Cheney’s home, has had 12 deaths, the fewest of any state — but Wyoming ranks fourth in deaths per capita, tying with Montana at 2.3. California’s dead number 429, the most of any state.

The official count of the wounded U.S. soldiers is 29,000 but it’s probably more, and over 1.2 million Iraqis have lost their lives.

As a fallen U.S. soldier put it a few months before he was killed by an IED, “Why are we in this hell over here? why? i cant stop askin why? the more i think the more i cry. why? ” (Ryan Hill, Myspace blog, Nov. 1, 2006)

We’ve spent $600 billion on the war so far, and the total may be as much as $4 trillion by the time it’s all over. And though the Bush administration claims the “surge” is a “success,” the New York Times writes:

The year 2007 would prove to be especially hard on American service members; more of them died last year than in any other since the war began. Many of those deaths came in the midst of the 30,000-troop buildup known as “the surge,” the linchpin of President Bush’s strategy to tamp down widespread violence between Islamic Sunnis and Shiites, much of it in the country’s capital, Baghdad. In April, May and June alone, 331 American service members died, making it the deadliest three-month period since the war began.

Cheney’s part in initiating the invasion and, with his old pal, former secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld, presiding over some of the occupation’s worst mistakes, is documented on Frontline’s two-part, four-and-a-half-hour program, Bush’s War, aired on PBS this week.

On the home front, although no one in the administration is addressing it, the bleed-off from the Iraq occupation has led the economy into an inflationary spiral, and there’s less funding for health care, education, housing and public works. Sleazy lending practices may leave millions homeless and yet we’re bailing out the big guys. The U.S. debt is $9.4 trillion, the trade deficit is $164 billion. Gas is more than $3 per gallon and oil has hit over $100 a barrel.

So? So we’re paying for the war, Dick, and some of us are dying for it.