And now for my friend, Gary the Ogre's, Rant-O-The-Day:
I don't believe our situation is the result of a conspiracy - it's much too complex for that. This goes much much deeper than a political plot and it permeates most phases of American life and institutions. It didn't start with Regan or Bush II. The seemingly unwitting slide towards banana republicdom is a process that has progressed since the beginning of the cold war. Bush II and his allies might have served one useful purpose though: finally waking Americans up to his sham excuse for a government and leadership, and perhaps the budding ability to recognize a bald-faced lie when they hear one. The only president who seemed to realize what was going on and try to warn people was Eisenhower who warned about the dangerous growth of a "military industrial complex" in America - this from a former Army general.
BTW: My definition of a banana republic is a country ruled indirectly by a wealthy ruling class (the number or names of the political parties is irrelevant, although two seems to be a good working number in our case) who fund and influence a sham democracy in order to make themselves wealthy at the expense of the vast majority of the population and the environment itself. In order to stay in power the ruling class must eventually use their government lackies to create a police state to stifle dissent and control the media (they already pretty much do control the national news media). Those who fund this process sit on the boards and serve as executive officers of nearly all major corporations. Their operatives are the three branches of government.
In order to succeed the sham democracy must have a pliant population that will believe their lies and propaganda. This process can only succeed by undercutting the nation's public education system to "dumb the people down" and eventually make college unattainable to the non-wealthy. By design a banana republic cannot remain a significant world power. Eventually it must consume itself in human, environmental, and economic terms until some critical state is reached: revolution, civil war, partition, etc. History is littered with "great civilizations" and nations that fell apart for one reason or another. This is nothing new or unusual. It is not inevitable although I remain extremely pessimistic.
It's 12 minutes to "banana" on my banana republic clock.
Of course I could be full of shit and nations of the world are just making some sort of transition into a post nation state form of organization that will be somehow better. Whatever system evolves the question for me is: Who is in control and who benefits? Like Deep Throat said "Follow the money."
Thought question for the day: What would Jesus think of "corporate personhood"?