December, 17 2009, 12:54pm EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Sam Husseini, (202) 347-0020; or David Zupan, (541) 484-9167
Afghanistan: * Just War? * Five Times GDP
WASHINGTON
DANIEL C. MAGUIRE
Maguire is professor of moral theological ethics at Marquette University and is the author of The Horrors We Bless: Rethinking the Just-War Legacy.
He recently wrote that in Obama's Nobel Prize address the president "hoisted his petard on the classical 'just war theory,' a theory that, properly understood, condemns his decision to send yet more kill-power into Afghanistan. This theory, which is much misused and little understood, is designed to build a wall of assumptions against state-sponsored violence, i.e. war. It puts the burden of proof on the warrior where it belongs. It gives six conditions necessary to justify a war. Fail one, and the war is immoral." See Maguire's analysis of the six conditions.
JO COMERFORD
Executive director of the National Priorities Project, Comerford just wrote the piece "$57,077.60: Surging by the Minute," which states: "We could have dedicated that $30 billion [of escalation costs] to job creation. According to a recent report issued by the Political Economy Research Institute, that sum could generate a whopping 537,810 construction jobs or 541,080 positions in healthcare, or fund 742,740 teachers or employ 831,390 mass transit workers. ...
"In Afghan terms, our upcoming single year of war costs represents nearly five times that country's gross domestic product or $3,623.70 for every Afghan woman, man, and child." https://www.tomdispatch.com/archive/175179
The UN estimates Afghanistan's 2008 per capita GDP at $466, the CIA at $800.
A nationwide consortium, the Institute for Public Accuracy (IPA) represents an unprecedented effort to bring other voices to the mass-media table often dominated by a few major think tanks. IPA works to broaden public discourse in mainstream media, while building communication with alternative media outlets and grassroots activists.
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