Tuesday, September 18, 2007

Basic Economics on the Surge

Oliver R. Goodenough ("a professor of law at Vermont Law School and a faculty fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School") explains Lessons on the surge from economics 101 using a "dollar auction".

"America is long past the possibility of some kind of profitable outcome in Iraq. Neo-con dreams of a quick, cheap victory, delivering democracy and peace and self-financed from Iraq's own oil revenue, got us started on this misadventure."

"We can cut our losses now and take our lumps, or we can keep throwing good money after bad until maybe we wear the other side out, but in the process raising our own ultimate losses substantially. And in Iraq, the losses are already desperately high, on both sides, in blood, in money, and in the erosion of institutions like law and national cohesion."

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