Recall in the SOTU address, Bush singled out earmarks. He has said that this pork costs $18 billion a year.

We've recently learned that Bush will be sending up to an additional 28,000 troops and support personnel to Iraq, along with the already-proposed 21,500, making it a grand total approaching 50,000. The cost is expected to be $27 billion for the first year.

Compare this $27 billion figure to the $18 billion for earmarks. Notice that Bush did not mention one word in the SOTU about any cost figures associated with this Iraq occupation. However, he did mention earmarks and has since played up the $18 billion figure as huge and disgraceful.

Yes, earmarks are indeed wasteful and unnecessary, but let us first remember that Bush has asked for another $245 billion for the war and many expect that when all is said and done it will cost us one trillion dollars.

But with regards to the $27 billion to finance just the "surge" plan as compared to the $18 billion in pork, I'm fairly certain no earmark has ever been tied to loss of human life. Many on both sides of the aisle have concluded this escalation will most likely fail and unfortunately will result in many more dead. In that sense, the costs in both monetary and human life terms, Bush's "surge" plan is more wasteful and unnecessary and wrong than those awful earmarks.

Yet you can be certain he'll be lambasting pork to many a GOP-friendly audience and not utter a word about any such costs associated with Iraq. It's called diversion or wagging the dog....