The war in Iraq costs $720,000,000.00 a day.
From the Washington Post:
Even today, Iraqi electrical generation meets barely half the daily national requirements. Baghdad households now receive power an average of 12 hours each day -- six hours fewer than when Saddam Hussein ruled. Oil production still has not returned to pre-invasion levels. Reports of widespread fraud, waste and sheer ineptitude in the administration of U.S. aid have become so commonplace that they barely last a news cycle. (Recall, for example, the 110,000 AK-47s, 80,000 pistols, 135,000 items of body armor and 115,000 helmets intended for Iraqi security forces that, according to the Government Accountability Office, the Pentagon cannot account for.) U.S. officials repeatedly complain, to little avail, about the paralyzing squabbling inside the Iraqi parliament and the rampant corruption within Iraqi ministries. If a primary function of government is to provide services, then the government of Iraq can hardly be said to exist.

Two very interesting news items this week. One of my former students won the District Metropolitan Opera Auditions last week. Yesterday I found out that another former student, Anne-Carolyn Bird, began singing with the Metropolitan Opera last year. I've had two sing on Broadway, but this is the first at the Met. It makes me smile.