The Imperial Colon

The reason is simple:  the American Empire lacks the one quality that has made empires of the past such robust successes—constipation. 

You heard me right.

Show me a man who’s gone three weeks without a movement, and I’ll show you a mean mother who can snuff a third-world dictator or wipe out an indigenous people without breaking a sweat.

It’s all documented in Sir Arthur Sitsbalther’s seminal work, The Iron Colon:  Colonialism and Constipation in Fifteenth Century Europe.[i]

Here’s the gist of his thesis:  When Europe embarked on its colonial expansion in the fifteenth century, its diet was grain-based.  Sitsbalther points out that while a certain amount of fiber in the diet promotes regularity, there is a tipping point beyond which too much fiber has the opposite effect.[ii]  For the Europeans, it was all grain, all the time.  Those people were bound up and loaded for bear. 

Now, here’s the rub.  A gastrointestinal dialectic was at work.  As Europeans expanded into the tropical climes, more fruit was introduced into their diet.  More fruit meant more regularity.  And the more regular a man is, the softer he is, both literally and figuratively.  So it was that the European Empire tanked in the twentieth century.

We see the same patterns with the Romans.  Now, they were empire builders.  Everywhere they went they took a stack of 4x6s and a box of nails.  Look at them wrong, and they hung you out to dry.

In the beginning, their army travelled on bread and grain.  It is an established historical fact that the smallest structure in a Roman camp was the latrine.  A Legion could get by with a two-holer.[iii]  The world never stood a chance.

Then the empire spread into the Middle East, and figs and dates entered their diet.  Before they knew it, hordes of bound up barbarians were pounding at the gates of Rome.

We must learn from history.  The only way America will be a world-class empire is to bind up our men and women our armed forces.

America didn’t go soft because of drugs and sex; she went soft because of too many fruit-flavored jelly beans in too many Easter baskets.

The first rule of empire building is, "Regularity is for wimps."