Welcome to the American kleptocracy.

[smoogatz]

It's plain old, bold-as-brass, broad-daylight highway robbery. The audacity of it is stunning. The crime of the millenium is happening right in front of our eyes, and the Democrats in congress are standing there blinking, watching Bush and his buddies back the armored cars up to the Treasury and unlock the gates. Either they're in on it (which is most likely the case), or they're too dumb and/or too timid to do anything to stop it. Either way, they're not worth a bucket of warm piss. But I guess we already knew that. The next step, I'm pretty sure, is that we're going to look a lot like the Soviet Union in the 1980s: bits of the Empire will start to peel away (see Latin America), the mass of people will be impoverished while a few criminals become exceedingly wealthy, we'll be unable to maintain our infrastructure or our military, and our manufacturing base will sit abandoned, with no capital to keep it running. You're going to see a massive brain drain, too, over the next 5-10 years, as other countries hire our best and brightest away (and as the U.S. becomes more oppressive and hostile to intellectuals). I think Bush and his pals saw the writing on the wall regarding the elections, and decided they'd better strike while the iron was hot (expect blanket, pre-emptive pardons next). Jesus. It's incredible, the balls on these people. The American ruling class is now entirely above the law.

[jpak]

1. Kleptocracy? maybe Kleptoreich? Definitely

:mad: