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Essay: Anatomy of the Deep State
http://billmoyers.com/2014/02/21/anatomy-of-the-deep-state/#3Rome lived upon its principal till ruin stared it in the face. Industry is the only true source of wealth, and there was no industry in Rome. By day the Ostia road was crowded with carts and muleteers, carrying to the great city the silks and spices of the East, the marble of Asia Minor, the timber of the Atlas, the grain of Africa and Egypt; and the carts brought out nothing but loads of dung. That was their return cargo.
The Martyrdom of Man by Winwood Reade (1871)
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There is the visible government situated around the Mall in Washington, and then there is another, more shadowy, more indefinable government that is not explained in Civics 101 or observable to tourists at the White House or the Capitol. The former is traditional Washington partisan politics: the tip of the iceberg that a public watching C-SPAN sees daily and which is theoretically controllable via elections. The subsurface part of the iceberg I shall call the Deep State, which operates according to its own compass heading regardless of who is formally in power. [1]
During the last five years, the news media has been flooded with pundits decrying the broken politics of Washington. The conventional wisdom has it that partisan gridlock and dysfunction have become the new normal. That is certainly the case, and I have been among the harshest critics of this development. But it is also imperative to acknowledge the limits of this critique as it applies to the American governmental system. On one level, the critique is self-evident: In the domain that the public can see, Congress is hopelessly deadlocked in the worst manner since the 1850s, the violently rancorous decade preceding the Civil War.
Yes, there is another government concealed behind the one that is visible at either end of Pennsylvania Avenue, a hybrid entity of public and private institutions ruling the country
As I wrote in The Party is Over, the present objective of congressional Republicans is to render the executive branch powerless, at least until a Republican president is elected (a goal that voter suppression laws in GOP-controlled states are clearly intended to accomplish). President Obama cannot enact his domestic policies and budgets: Because of incessant GOP filibustering, not only could he not fill the large number of vacancies in the federal judiciary, he could not even get his most innocuous presidential appointees into office. Democrats controlling the Senate have responded by weakening the filibuster of nominations, but Republicans are sure to react with other parliamentary delaying tactics. This strategy amounts to congressional nullification of executive branch powers by a party that controls a majority in only one house of Congress.
Much more at link...
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It's a long article but well worth your time.
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Essay: Anatomy of the Deep State (Original Post)
Javaman
Apr 2014
OP
Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)1. Bill Moyers is a national treasure
and this article is a great example of why.
[font size=8 color=red]K&R![/font]
Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)2. I hope the only reason there are so few recs here is that
everyone is still reading the essay.
This is one of the most important things to appear on DU in a long time.
Oh--And I misattributed the piece to Moyers. It was actually written by Mik Lofgren.
Xinh loi.
tech3149
(4,452 posts)4. Hopefully you're right about the recs
I had read it about the time it came out and it a long read, especially when you search out other resources on the subject. There have been many before Lofgren talking and writing about the concept for decades. It's funny how little press it seems to get.
hedda_foil
(16,375 posts)3. Thanks for posting this incredibly important article.
dixiegrrrrl
(60,010 posts)5. The Martyrdom of Man is available, I jsut downloaded it free
https://archive.org/details/cu31924029764739
A lot of books written before 1900's are fascinating, to me.
So thanks for the reference as well as the good read on Shadow Government.
A lot of books written before 1900's are fascinating, to me.
So thanks for the reference as well as the good read on Shadow Government.
Jackpine Radical
(45,274 posts)6. This thread should not be allowed to die.