Counting The Seconds At Home And Abroad

NOB HILL--Most of our blended family were sitting around the dinner table tonight and the conversation drifted into how most people don't really figure out the difference between a million, a billion, and a trillion. Especially in today's political environment, it seems easy to get away with enormous amounts of dough. MaryAnn's son Ethan came up with this enlightening illustration.

If a person counted one number per second, it would take about 11 days to count to one million. It would take 33 years to count to one billion. Yet they sound so similar to most of us.

Along that line, the British newspaper Guardian Unlimited ran a story today with enormous numbers. But unless you stop the think about the real enormity of the amounts, it hardly seems to raise an eyebrow. The Republicans in Congress attack the U.N. for mismanaging the Iraqi oil-for-food program...but there seems to be another story.

Fraud and corruption

Forget the UN. The US occupation regime helped itself to $8.8 bn of mostly Iraqi money in just 14 months

George Monbiot
Tuesday February 8, 2005
The Guardian