DO NOT GIVE THAT FOOL FULL CONTROL OF 25 BILLION DOLLARS
Wolfowitz: Iraq, Afghan costs could top $50B
Lawmakers, official tangle over control of spending
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will cost more than $50 billion next year, a top Defense Department official told Congress Thursday in the Bush administration's clearest description yet of the conflicts' price tags.
The remarks by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz's edged the administration toward critics' estimates that combat will cost closer to $75 billion in the budget year that starts October 1. White House budget chief Joshua Bolten earlier this year had said that next year's spending would probably be $50 billion.
Wolfowitz also seemed to open the door to compromise over the White House's unusual request for full control over the first $25 billion for the wars. Congress is expected to provide the money, but members of the Senate Armed Services Committee lambasted the unfettered flexibility the proposal would give the president.
Look what happened last time you trusted him with a bag of money. Instead of spending it where he promised…Afghanistan…he used it to prepare for the invasion of Iraq.
