The National Priorities Project has a real eye-opening website that calculates the cost of the War in Iraq and them compares it to what we could do with that money.

As a resident of California, here’s what they say we could be doing:

Taxpayers in California will pay $40.3 billion for the cost of war in Iraq. For the same amount of money, the following could have been provided:

• 16,733,296 People with Health Care or
• 627,551 Elementary School Teachers or
• 4,767,634 Head Start Places for Children or
• 25,168,314 Children with Health Care or
• 235,246 Affordable Housing Units or
• 4,390 New Elementary Schools or
• 7,685,109 Scholarships for University Students or
• 616,017 Music and Arts Teachers or
• 741,482 Public Safety Officers or
• 117,140,845 Homes with Renewable Electricity or
• 601,790 Port Container Inspectors

Go check out what the trade-offs are for your state.