This Goes A Long Way in Explaining What is Going On.

Absolute Power- The Making of the New World Order
by Richard K. Moore
Toward Freedom magazine, May 1998
The dominant trend of our time is globalization, marked by elimination of trade barriers, downsized governments, greater reliance on the private sector, reduced regulation of business, and an increasingly global economy. Many people call that economic progress, but this form of globalization is actually political regression, threatening to destroy democratic institutions and revert to something resembling feudalism.
In some ways, the US is central to the process. It's the leading free trade proponent, and provides the primary military muscle to maintain global order. When the US president speaks on international issues, his words are taken seriously. Yet, the US isn't the primary beneficiary of globalization, and doesn't appear to be exploiting its advantage in the traditional fashion.
The reason should be obvious: Globalization isn't about competition among nations, it's about the increasing power of mega-corporations over nations. In effect, the US government acts as a proxy for elite corporate interests, not as a representative of its people or even national interests in any conventional sense. Although sovereign national states are the Familiar World Order, globalization is leading us inexorably toward a New World Order mega-corporations (and the wealthy elite who control them) reign supreme, while nations are reduced to a vestigial, subservient, policing role-as seen in much of the Third World.

Richard K Moore, a former software developer, lives in Ireland, where he is developing a book on globalization and moderates cyberjournal@cpsr org
New World Order
much more here:
http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/New_World_Order/Absolute_Power.html