Here's an interesting article which breaks down the financial cost of the Iraq war and evaluates the proportion which different economic classes pay [Fortune]. "The President just asked Congress for $75 billion to cover the next six months..." That's the next six months. What have we spent already? The initial deployment of forces to Iraq, reported by the Congressional Budget Office in October, was up to $13 billion. There don't appear to be an actual tallies available yet for what has actually been spent. In February, estimates were around $50-100 billion for the initial war [BBC]. Ignoring costs of reconstruction, long-term occupation, and possible instability caused by paramilitaries from Iraq and other Arab countries, a very optimistic estimate places us at about $135 billion. For perspective on this figure, the total federal expenditure on public education for 1999-2000 was $382 billion [policy almanac].