One one-thousand … two one-thousand … 3.8 trillion one-thousand

President Barack Obama has unveiled his new budget for fiscal year 2011 at $3.8 trillion dollars. Staggeringly huge. Brobdingnagianly big. Almost inconceivable. Just how much is a trillion dollars? Here are some comparisons.

The brain consists of about a hundred billion neurons, which is about the same as the number of stars in the Milky Way galaxy. A hundred billion is 1011, or a 1 following by 11 zeros: 100,000,000,000. That's about what Obama plans to spend on Veterans Affairs ($57...