Friday-Sunday, April 25-27, 2008

THE U.S. POWER STRUCTURE

Who Really Runs the World

Part One

A few weeks ago, a reader corresponded with me and told me that it was great that
I pointed out all the shenanigans that the U.S. government has perpetrated over
the years in controlling foreign countries. But, he asked, "Who benefits?" Good
point.

For the answer, I went to my good friend Frank Morrow. I have published a couple
of interviews with him over the past several years. From 1978 to 1998, Frank
produced the finest political TV show in history, Alternative Views. In the 20-year
span, almost 600 segments were broadcast.

Frank Morrow is my political mentor. I began watching Alternative Views in the

mid-1980s and became involved with analyzing politics. It was like being hooked on
hard drugs. There would be no Malcom Lagauche today if it weren’t for Frank
Morrow. Depending on your outlook, some people say that might have been a good
thing.

Frank’s specialty is the U.S. power structure. He gained his PhD from the University
of Texas in 1984 and his 600+ page thesis was on the subject.

This in-depth interview covers much ground and makes it clear that what we see in
the U.S. political scene is not real. The game of the powerful began with the
formation of the United States. Part one will delve into these times and will be the
foundation for the next interviews that go into detail about how we have come to
live in a unipolar world that is controlled by people who may not have names that
are recognizable to the general public.

IN THE BEGINNING

ML: Frank, explain who benefits from all the dirty tricks we see pulled today by
U.S. policies.

FM: A lot of people benefit, but the more important question is "who has the
power?" Bill Gates benefits from the system, and is immensely rich, but he doesn’t
have the power that people will less money have. For that, you have to go back and
see if there is an American ruling class, and, if so, who are they and what do they
do.

We can go back and look at the Constitutional Convention and see how our system
was set up to provide fences so that the common people could not exert their
influence over the government. This has been going on ever since.

One reason I got interested in who controls things and who runs things is that
growing up while in high school and college, I notice that, over the years, no matter
who was president, the working class always got it in the neck. I asked how there
could be continuous power against the workers if we have a democracy where
people can get their interests taken care of.
ML: Take us back to the beginning.

FM: The Declaration of Independence was written to express the discontent of the
American radicals and people who wanted to break away from England. They were
using that as a document on the basis and justification for their breaking away.

Let’s talk about the Constitution. I will say Constitutions. By the way, this is
something that I’ve finally become aware of and you’re the first person I’ve talked
with about it.

The Constitutional Convention came about because the elite wanted a government
that they could control, not only for economic interests, but also for political
interests. There was an established national government spelled out in the Articles
of Confederation. In those articles, it said they could be amended, but they had to
have unanimous consent of all states. The states seemed to be okay with that.

Then, certain people (sometimes referred to as the Founding Fathers) got together
in Philadelphia and sealed themselves up in secrecy during the summer. It was
certainly understandable they would seal themselves up because they were
planning a coup. They proclaimed that a new Constitution was necessary and it
would go into effect once nine out of 13 states ratified it. This was a coup because
they illegally overthrew the existing government.

There are two important books that go into detail of these times. One was
published in 1913 and written by Charles Beard: An Economic Interpretation of the
Constitution. That was a bombshell that people have been arguing about ever
since. His main thesis was that these people in Philadelphia were not the highbrow
individuals who are highly intellectual. People who wanted to do good for the
country because they loved democracy. It was just the opposite.

A more recent book is To Form a More Perfect Union. It was written by Robert
McGuire, a statistics expert. He confirmed much of what Beard was saying.

ML: We have been led to believe that the Founding Fathers held wisdom,
intelligence and foresight far above those traits of mortal men. Have we been
conned?

FM: Definitely. Let me explain how the founders usurped power.

The people in the convention, Madison in particular, said the country is divided into
two groups: people who have power and property and people who don’t. The
people who don’t have it will try to take it away from the people who do have it
unless we come up with a system that will prevent them from doing this. As
Madison said, in some of this writings, including the Federalist Papers, we have to
come up with a system with enough flaws in it so it appears to be democratic, but
there are enough flaws so the common people cannot coalesce and get their needs
taken care of. The country will be run by the elite.

John Jay, one of the writers of the Federalist Papers, as well as the first Chief
Justice of the Supreme Court, and all those people at the convention, with the
exception of maybe one, agreed that the people who own the country ought to run
it. If you look at what the people were saying, it came out much more democratic
in appearance than what they really wanted. Many wanted a king or a tightly-
controlled aristocracy.
In the propaganda we were taught while growing up, they say, "They have all these
different things. The three branches of government and voting which doesn’t occur
all at once and the judges are elected for life.

During the convention, there was fear that the people would all get together and
vote in some strongman who could articulate what the people wanted. The founders
had to set up a structure that would prevent that, and they did.

History books say that if there would have been free and fair elections, the
Constitution never would have passed. There were all kinds of shenanigans that
went on. As a matter of fact, there were four or five states who did not support the
Constitution, but approved it only if there would be a subsequent open convention,
or if there was a Bill of Rights.

The framers of the Constitution in Philadelphia did not want a Bill of Rights. There
were Bills of Rights in some constitutions of the states, but they did not want a
national Bill of Rights. However, in December 1791, the Congress passed the first
Ten Amendments, the Bill of Rights. It was forced on the founders.

You really have two Constitutions that have come down all these years: one for the
people and the other for the wealthy and powerful. Of course, the governments
were still controlled by the wealthy and powerful, so that any time there were
conflicts, any time there were dangers to the Constitution, there was always the Bill
of Rights. It wasn’t the basic Constitution. That started with John Adams and then
Lincoln and it came right down. They still don’t mess with the basic Constitution.

They’ve now destroyed the Bill of Rights. They just ignore them, or they’ve made
executive orders to circumvent the Bill of Rights and the Supreme Court has upheld
all this stuff. During the Reagan presidency, a lot of people in the administration,
including himself, for a period of time were saying, "We really don’t need these
pesky amendments. All we need is the basic Constitution." That didn’t gain much
popular traction, but you can tell here is this continuity of control, and it was
designed into the system.

— In Part Two: Enter the Private Organizations