Iraq surplus

Obama repeated a stale talking point when he said, "We're spending $10 billion a month in Iraq at a time when the Iraqis have a $79 billion surplus, $79 billion." As we've pointed out when Obama said it on the campaign trail, when he repeated it at the last debate, and even when Biden mentioned the figure in the vice presidential debate, that number is wrong. The Iraqis actually "have" $29.4 billion in the bank. The Government Accountability Office projected in August that Iraq's 2008 budget surplus could range anywhere from $38.2 billion to $50.3 billion, depending on oil revenue, price and volume. Then, in early August, the Iraqi legislature passed a $21 billion supplemental spending bill. The supplemental will be completely funded by this year's surplus, and that means that the Iraqi's will not have $79 billion in the bank. They could have about $59 billion that could, would, and should be spent to rebuild their country.
Source-factcheck.org