4. It replaces rational reconstruction and policy making at home with Empire building.
5. Social fragmentation occurs as popular and local leaders, backed by angry and rebellious constituents, take matters into their own hands.
Does the US Meet Vaknin's Five Criteria?
1. Is the US a zombie state?
The total corruption, by corporate interests, of the US electoral system, as well as Congress and the Presidency, has been well documented and is of major concern across the political spectrum.
As for the inability of the US government to govern, Vaknin, like Roberts, is very concerned about the failure of federal agencies to perform their statutory regulatory function. He cites the inability of the Federal Emergency Management Authority (FEMA) to address the catastrophe in New Orleans following Katrina, as well as the failure of the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC), Federal Deposit Insurance (FDIC), and US Treasury to address the banking crisis that caused the economic collapse. He also points out the Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) failure to adequately monitor or manage lethal prescription drugs.
Obviously his article was written pre-2010, but the US government failure to prevent or adequately manage the worst environmental catastrophe in world history (the BP oil spill) is obviously another example. Roberts and other analysts give other example of serious governance failures: the continuing decline in America's manufacturing base, food "deserts" in inner cities, a debt crisis worse than Greece's, the steep decline in the US dollar, massive youth unemployment, and a local government funding crisis - with dangerous cutbacks in law enforcement, street lighting and schools and potential defaults on municipal bonds.
2. Are Americans disgruntled, hostile and suspicious?
There are numerous right wing Republicans and left leaning progressives who are extremely unhappy with the way Obama has been running the country. Both have been extremely vocal about it - in the media and in the streets. Based on the fact Obama and Bush enjoy similar low approval ratings, I would expect this dissatisfaction with government to either remain constant or to increase, no matter which party is in power.
3. Do other countries regard the US with derision, fear and abhorrence?
Based on what I read in foreign press, overseas' views of the US are pretty negative, but fall well short of "derision, fear, and abhorrence." Nevertheless there seems to be universal disapproval of the US wars in the Middle East, as well has strong condemnation of blatant war crimes the US government has committed in the prosecution of these wars. These include the indefinite detention of so-called "terrorists" in Guantanomo without access to judicial process; the use of torture; the targeting of civilian populations via ground assault, bombers, and drones; and the practice of "extraordinary rendition" (CIA kidnapping of civilians on European soil to be transported to totalitarian regimes that engage in torture).
I only encounter frank "derision, fear, and abhorrence" in refugees from Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan - or from other countries affected by US military or economic "intervention." This could include replacing (through military aggression or covert CIA economic sabotage or "terrorism") a democratically elected government with a puppet dictator; active suppression of a popular movement to overthrow a dictator; or annihilation of a third world economy via predatory IMF and World Bank lending practices or the wholesale dumping of cheap US agricultural surpluses.
The following is a partial list of democratic governments and/and or popular movements that were brought down by the US government:
- Iran 1953
- Vietnam 1954-1975
- Guatemala 1954, 1993
- Democratic Republic of the Congo 1960
- Iraq 1963, 1968, 1973
- Brazil 1964
- Indonesia 1965
- Ghana 1966
- Chile 1973
- Afghanistan 1973
- Argentina 1976
- Iran 1980
- Nicaragua 1981-1990
- El Salvador 1980-1992
- Cambodia 9980-95
- Angola 1980-90
- Philippines 1986
- Serbia 2000
- Haiti 2004
- Palestinian Authority 2006-2011
- Somalia 2006-2007
The topic of America's predatory economic policy is far too complex to do justice in a short essay. Economist Michael Hudson has an excellent article in Counterpunch in 2009 regarding the destructive role the IMF (which is dominated by US investment banks) plays in the developing world: http://www.counterpunch.org/hudson04062009.html. I also highly recommend John Perkins' 2004 book Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and these other references:
http://www.tradeobservatory.org/library.cfm?RefID=37655
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