It's a real problem when a political monopoly gets into the hands of a business monopolist; the traditional offspring is called facism, although we probably won't hear that term being used in this context. Much too blunt, don't ya know! The battle of the bills -- Rights versus Dollars -- is always ugly. Especially where oil is involved. Half the funds spent on warfare in the last five years could have taken us a long way toward being wholly energy-independent, even energy-renewable, but it would have cut across too many goddam ricebowls -- big fat greasy ricebowls at that.


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