I just finished viewing the final season's episodes of Netflix's "House of Cards", based on the British mini-series of the same name. It vividly portrays how the political system works, or rather 'fails to work'. The treachery, lies, power struggles, ambition on steroids, even cold blooded murder are all embraced by the hypocrisy of a corrupt top heavy empire---whether it be the British or our own. "House of Cards" shows what this Amerikan Empire is: a tragic black satire that takes no prisoners---accepting of course the multitude of enemy combatants via our phony and illegal so called 'Wars'.
Each time this writer tunes into or channel surfs through C-Span to watch our 'government at work', it disgusts me! The entire Congress, with few exceptions, is part of this 'bought and paid for' Two Party / One Party empire. They bicker and quarrel over the few crumbs from the table of the super-rich who pull their strings. We all know that this newest 'stooge' at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave is probably the worst yet--- however not too far below the rest of the bunch.
All in all, these presidents and their entourages in Congress and the White House all make sure that their corporate donors and the Pentagon get first dibs on the feast of our tax revenues. Of course, the greatest propaganda tool, as old as Methuselah, is the fear card. If you get the suckers to fear for their lives, you control the game. Ditto for the fear of losing out to the hordes of 'People of Color', documented or not, that have come 'threatening' or are coming to 'threaten' their jobs, and 'heaven forbid' move in next door.
Ever notice how all that our politicos from both phony parties spend most of their TV time talking about is the ' next election'. They will stand there in front of the cameras and not really address the fact that half of our tax money goes to military related spending. Or that they, our elected officials and public servants, have a better and FREE healthcare coverage than most of their constituents. On top of that the voting suckers keep electing millionaires and mega-millionaires to represent them.
Meanwhile, we keep spending AND sending our military all over the globe to 'Patrol for the Super-Rich'. Then they wonder why the rest of the world hates us. Well, the Chinese and the Russians are lining up a multitude of nations to join with them in a new 'Silk Road of commerce', circumventing the US petrodollar. All that our 'Masters of Empire' can come up with is to threaten war. Even that will fail, as will this 'Empire of Cards'---unless---we push out the gang of them and pull back the empire.
Hope Springs Eternal.