Or is it that these avaricious, bellicose de facto rulers of America have treated humanity with contempt for years and are simply targeting their latest scapegoat?
Perhaps the answer lies in Adam Smith's quote, cited by Noam Chomsky in his latest book:
"the vile maxim of the masters of mankind: "All for ourselves, and nothing for other people."
Noam Chomsky recently penned Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy, a book in which he provided a powerfully-constructed and heavily documented argument that the United States is a failed state, like many of the nations it has declared to be threats to itself and its allies.
As Chomsky suggested, the Bush Regime and its multiple components (including corporate interests, many of America's wealthy, certain radical segments of the Christian population, AIPAC and its supporters, and those amongst the middle and working class still beguiled by the corporate media) have been quick to label other nations as failed states to achieve their imperialist goals.
Iraq was a failed state and a threat to the United States. Hence the invasion and occupation. Haiti was a failed state and its people were suffering. Enter United States intervention and subsequent Haitian misery.
According to Chomsky, there are three essential components to a failed state:
1. their inability or unwillingness to protect their citizens from violence and perhaps even destruction.
2. their tendency to regard themselves as beyond the reach of domestic or international law, and hence free to carry out aggression and violence.
3. And if they have democratic forms, they suffer from a serious "democratic deficit" that deprives their formal democratic institutions of real substance.
Examples abound to support Chomsky's assertion that the United States is indeed as much of a failed state as those it is so quick to criticize, subvert, and in some cases, invade.
America began to decline seriously under Reagan, continued its precipitous drop under Bush I and Clinton, and has reached disturbing lows under Bush II. Whether Republican or Democrat, successive United States governments degenerated into an entity which is betraying a majority of its people and is a significant threat to the continued existence of the human species: a failed state.
Human Beings are Expendable in our Quest for Money and Power
Under Bush II, the United States launched an invasion against a sovereign nation which posed no threat to the United States or its allies. US-driven UN economic sanctions had neutered Hussein militarily while resulting in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians.
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