Education by government: A federally funded program teaches that AIDS can be transmitted through tears. Another federal program to fight AIDS refuses to authorize the use of condoms,

Who’s in charge? Since President Monroe, U.S. presidents have issued “signing statements” designed to clarify presidential interpretation of new laws. In the two centuries before G. W. Bush there were a total of 600. He has signed over 800, most of which essentially claim that he can do as he sees fit.

Time payments: Assuming the same percentage of military medical claims as those filed in the gulf war, lifetime support for Iraq veterans will come to $127 billion. Extending that percentage to the VA brings the total to around $250 billion, a figure neither budgeted nor forecast by the administration.

Full employment: In 1979 there were 50,000 people in jail for non-violent, drug-associated crimes. Today there are almost 500,000 – the majority of whom are users, not dealers.

Another foreign policy success: The poppy crop in Afghanistan in 2006 was the biggest in history. That country now provides 92 percent of the world’s heroin.

And another: The drug war in Columbia has cost $4.2 billion since Bush took office. The price of a gram of cocaine here in the U.S. has fallen nearly 40 percent in that same period.

Everything is relative: This year China’s military budget is $45 billion. The US budget is $481 billion (plus Iraq costs)

Times change: John McCain, who strongly opposed the Bush tax cuts for the rich five years ago, last year voted to extend them. Also, he has decided to forego public financing (which he called “the only way to eliminate corruption”) for his own campaign for president in ’08.

Pollution redux: In 1900 there were 3 million horses in our cities, each producing 25 pounds of manure a day. It clogged street passage and storm drains, damaged people’s shoes and, when dried, turned to penetrating, acid dust.

Inflation happens: In 2004 the monthly U.S. cost in Iraq was $4.7 billion. Now it is $9 billion.

Why we went to war: Oil production in Iraq when the war began, 3.2 million barrels per day. It is now 2.1 million.

Personal experience: Pope Urban VIII threatened excommunication for use of tobacco because it promoted sneezing which, in the pope’s mind, was akin to sexual ecstasy.

Immigrant workers: The company building the wall between the U.S. and Mexico has paid a $5 million fine for hiring undocumented workers.

Boots on the ground: Non-U.S. coalition forces in Iraq in four years ago were 24,000. Now it’s 14,000. U.S. forces in those same years, 115,000, now 165,000.

Sex education: In Sweden sex education is compulsory in schools beginning at age 6 with emphasis on anatomy. At age 12 the emphasis is on disease, contraception, gender equity and loving relationships. Most Swedish cities sponsor sex clinics, which provide contraception and advice. Teen pregnancies in Sweden are 7 per 1,000. In the U.S., that rate is 49 per 1,000, and the gonorrhea rate is 600 times higher here.

Rodney Quinn, former secretary of state, lives and writes in Gorham.

Drug War: A 1994 Rand Analysis concluded that every dollar spent on treatment balanced against incarceration saves 7.46.

British experience: The UK routinely provided heroin for addicts from the 1920s to the 1960s and their reported drug population remained below 2000. Since 1971 when heroin was outlawed, the drug population has grown to 300,000.

Rodney Quinn is a freelance writer and former Maine secretary of state. He lives in Gorham.