There are 193 nations in the world. The United States of America has a military presence in about 137 of these with more than 700 military bases to protect our "national interests," whatever that means. The rest are probably the targets of CIA clandestine operations. President George W. Bush says; "We are not an empire." And the public wonders why people hate us.

Like so many other times, Bush believes that if he says it, if it's written into his speech by someone, then it must be true.

We've been through this with "weapons of mass destruction" ready to be unleashed upon us within fifteen minutes as well as a cakewalk invasion where the people of Iraq were supposed to throw rose petals at the feet of the liberators. We've seen it with promises of money for education, first responders, veteran's insurance and hospital care, plus my personal favorite "I will not touch Social Security money," all situations where he did just the opposite.

Bush gets all of the credit and glory for making the proposal and then doesn't show up for the wedding. His follow through is a disaster. Thousands are left in the church while his ushers continue to pass the basket. And they're all chanting his quaint mantra; "things will get worse before they get better."

Now, we are going to force democracy down the throats of the defeated and ever suffering people of tribal Iraq while teaching them American values. Winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi people is what our president calls it.

Unfortunately, this seems to mean killing as many of them as it takes to make them tolerate us; building an embassy in the luxurious squalor of the former dictator; throwing much of the male population in prisons where they can be tortured; establishing military bases from which we can attack the rest of Middle East Islam; and giving the franchises for body piercing and tattoo parlors to Halliburton.

By now, it should be obvious that the "prisoner abuse" scandal would never have surfaced if it hadn't been for a handful of photographs and videos that somehow leaked out. Too bad, because now our national megalomaniacs have to come up with fantastic excuses and explanations of why torture is permissible, further confusing the American public about its moral and ethical values.

Our heroic Commander-in-Chief claims that he would "never order torture" and these vile acts were committed by a handful of disobedient and disoriented low level miscreants who would normally have been taking pictures of their loved ones and the family SUV in front of the Grand Canyon or the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Ironically, the United States is in an election year when the incumbent party must try to show that things are getting better and if they lose will get worse. Don't change horses in mid stream and all that sort of stuff. We're at war you know and the only one that can get us out of it is the man who got us into it.

The only real opposition party in this two is better than one system of choice believes that we invaded Iraq for the wrong reasons but now that we're there we've got to make the best of it. In other words, they all believe we should "stay the course" and not let the Iraqis go back to their tribal squabbles. The democrats can't argue against making Iraq a democracy, without an Electoral College of course, and pulling out now would be an embarrassment like Vietnam. Heaven forbid.

The empire building will continue and within a year, no matter who wins the election, we will have a new draft system patterned after Israel where there are no civilians, only military people trained to kill with the world's largest piles of weapons of mass destruction. Everyone from eighteen to forty-eight will be required to spend two years in active training and deployment, and then spend the balance of their productive years in the military reserve ready to be called up when needed.

We the people of America are left with a choice between Frick and Frack – again – the lesser of two evils or this time between oil and a ketchup dynasty. Oh well, corporate dynasties are the name of the game nowadays.

We've got huge corporations merging and monopolizing everything from entertainment to security. They are not yet as big and as powerful as the federal government, but they're trying. They even hire out as mercenaries to help the military with supply, reconstruction, security and running prisons for the modern army. And they do so without accountability to anyone, especially Congress.

To keep their profits up, spend their tax cuts, keep the New York Stock Exchange in the black, and build their own fiefdoms these conglomerates "out source" much of their labor to cheaper and sometimes smarter people in other nations. While building more and more weaponry is one of the government's strongest contributions to the job market, even the Pentagon claims that they would have to double their already outrageous budget if forced to "buy American." And the American people will not do anything about it until Anheuser-Bush moves to Mexico.

Worse of all, our representatives in Congress have abdicated their responsibility not only to declare war but to even read the bills that they pass. At a time when the Security and Exchange Commission should be looking into the federal government's trust fund scam and not letting the pharmaceutical industry get away with murder we've got a Congress that believes they can turn power over to the Administrative Branch by resolution instead of a constitutional amendment.

In short, the real question is not whether we should banish Bush to Gitmo but whether there is enough room down there for the entire administration and the 536 members of Congress as well.