America is staggering on the ropes, alienated from the world as never before and retaining support only from governments so dependent on the empire they are as useless to their people as the American regime is to ours. We�ve lost any pretense of moral leadership, if we ever had any, and only retain military power to coerce the world. And that is diminishing as imperial overreach adds to the problems of a bloodied warrior in the global ring, assaulted by spectators as well as opponents. Analogies to wrestling or boxing actually offend those violent sports, one of which is mostly theater, and the other dedicated to beating, rather than murdering, the opposition.

Still, the broken down brawler has the power to cause far more chaos before falling down for the count, taking tens of thousands more to the grave with him. While our hapless half-wit and his slightly less malevolent adversaries continue offering supernatural explanations for reality, even intervention by the corporate warlords who truly rule may be too late to avoid more pain.

Continued ranting about the alleged menace from Iran, and saturation of consciousness with presidential primaries and other corporate commercials, cannot fully distract from an economy that grows worse every day. The public suffers information denial syndrome, inflicted by corporate mind management. But its experience is far more practical than the theories of economic fundamentalists, who might better pray for a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow than create policy that might get us out of our fix.

We are under a domain of capitalism that has created a multi-trillion dollar debt that can never be repaid, and should be canceled. The credit organs of our commercially diseased anatomy won�t respond to the puny stimulus proposed by Wall Street clergy. It will take massive infusions of financial Viagra to keep them from becoming permanently flaccid. The masturbatory focus on the economy's private parts has created the widest gap between the rich and the rest of us since the Great Depression. Complete contempt for a public sector has almost totally destroyed what was once at least a primitive welfare state, replacing it with a private credit financed shopping mall where everyone buys with plastic, because nobody has any cash.

Social programs have been equated with communist terrorism, and government expenditures only deemed acceptable for waging imperial wars and increasing wealth for those who already have far too much. With individual consumers urged to find self-esteem by shopping themselves into social despair, a perverse market system sells collective immorality and labels it individual liberation. We are mesmerized into personal consumption, while our social order erodes under savage competition that finds the rich and their affluent servants gaining all the benefits, while everyone else absorbs all the costs.

Acting more and more like a cornered rat, our leadership threatens increased violence in the rest of the world, some of which is likely to come back home in ways worse than 9/11. Seeking discussion about this from participants in the political status quo protection racket is like seeking charity at a Vegas casino. Their short-term crackpot schemes, like putting a few billion dollars into individual hands so we can buy more stuff for ourselves, is the problem, not the solution. We need hundreds of billions of dollars put into the collective hands of a government controlled by a real democratic majority, so that our problems might begin to be dealt with. And those problems are not only economic.

After Bush�s miserable failure to rally former lackeys into becoming enemies of Iran, and after the imbecilic provocation in the Persian Gulf, Israel continued its slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza with a renewed vigor. Clearly, one nation responded to the ravings of an irrational leader from the USA. Echoing the party line of corporate Democratic candidates -- or perhaps they pre-quoted him? -- the CEO of the Jewish Apartheid state proclaimed that all options were on the table when it came to the menace of Iranian nuclear weapons, which do not exist, unlike Israel�s, which all the world knows about, with only the American government remaining mute despite having clear evidence of their existence since 1974. A near majority of citizens call for impeachment of the increasingly hallucinatory president, but the loyal opposition leader says that option is off the table. Got it kids? When it comes to the public�s wishes to get rid of the malignant moron, everything�s off the table, but everything�s on the table when supporting Israel�s wishes to get rid of Iran. Who�s in charge here?

A hopeful minority expects change with the next regime, but it may take a massive overdose of ecstasy, heroin and cocaine to offer that illusion. There will be what pundits call nuanced differences in many areas, but none at all in the horror that continues in Palestine, where the continuously savaged population, in hopeless despair at the treacherous complicity of American leadership, may yet take a retaliatory toll of their oppressors that could bring an explosion of violence beyond the present carnage. And we should not forget the suicidal warriors of Al Quaida, who are committed to get the West out of their world, with a high priority of ending American partnership with Israel in the destruction of Palestine.

Under these rapidly disintegrating conditions, the staggering empire must be stopped before its collapse destroys us all. Will the American people gain control of their renegade system, as the result of an aroused democratic struggle from within? Or will the global menace ultimately be contained, from the outside? We�d better hope it�s the first, which may not be pretty, because if it�s the second, it could be very, very ugly.

Copyright � 2008 Frank Scott. All rights reserved.