Here are some facts that you can throw at your liberal friends every time you seek to talk about government spending, and all they can come up with is "Well the Iraq war cost us .......". Randall Hoven of the American Thinker has a few facts to chew on:

• Obama's stimulus, passed in his first month in office, will cost more than the entire Iraq War -- more than $100 billion (15%) more.
• Just the first two years of Obama's stimulus cost more than the entire cost of the Iraq War under President Bush, or six years of that war.
• Iraq War spending accounted for just 3.2% of all federal spending while it lasted.
• Iraq War spending was not even one quarter of what we spent on Medicare in the same time frame.
• Iraq War spending was not even 15% of the total deficit spending in that time frame. The cumulative deficit, 2003-2010, would have been four-point-something trillion dollars with or without the Iraq War.
• The Iraq War accounts for less than 8% of the federal debt held by the public at the end of 2010 ($9.031 trillion).
• During Bush's Iraq years, 2003-2008, the federal government spent more on education that it did on the Iraq War. (State and local governments spent about ten times more.)

While you are at it, why don't you take a look at this report from the Wall Street Journal on how much our spending baseline has increased in 31 months ... $4.4 trillion.