WITHOUT THE SHALLOW STATE THERE WOULD BE NO DEEP STATE

Vince Dhimos answered a question at Quora.
 
https://www.quora.com/Considering-Chinas-governing-system-has-made-China-great-again-shouldnt-the-USA-accept-that-their-experiment-with-democracy-has-now-failed-and-adopt-Chinas-system-instead/answer/Vince-Dhimos
 
CONSIDERING CHINA’S SYSTEM HAS MADE CHINA GREAT AGAIN, SHOULDN’T THE USA ACCEPT THAT THEIR EXPERIMENT WITH DEMOCRACY HAS NOW FAILED AND ADOPT CHINA’S SYSTEM INSTEAD?
 
The question is technically appropriate, but it ignores the fact that the US can’t adopt the Chinese system, so whether it should or not is immaterial.
 
Why can’t it? Because to change the system would presuppose changing the American character, and therein lies the problem.
 
Many Americans, mostly on the right, blame the “Deep State” for all their ills, and their deep conviction that this “Deep State” is the bogeyman behind all their problems is why Trump was elected. Since it is true that a certain segment of the political class has tried to unseat President Trump, his sycophants believe that Trump rises completely above this Deep State and can overcome it, but in reality the Deep State, in the broadest sense, is nothing other than the US Establishment, which includes Trump and his cronies. After all, a salient characteristic of the Establishment is that it has bequeathed Americans two immutable givens, namely, US interference in foreign affairs (war, sanctions and regime change ops) and a debt-based (financialized) economy — as opposed to peace and harmony and a real economy that can pay its own bills without resorting to the Fed’s “printing press.” Trump has claimed to be an opponent of US meddling in foreign affairs but has so far not meaningfully asserted himself as opposing US meddling or a debt-based economy driven by the Federal Reserve’s habitual issuance of unbacked dollars – quite the opposite in fact. He has wholeheartedly embraced these 2 evils.
 
Let us not forget that shallow thinking is not just a function of the right wing. Democrats are equally moved by Establishment narratives designed to whip up warlike hysteria among the grassroots and by a belief in the almighty unbacked dollar as the driver of the US economy.
 
It is not the Deep State or Establishment that has foisted these two ills on America but rather the culture of the American people themselves, most (though not all) of whom we could very aptly call the Shallow State.
 
The Shallow State (on both sides of the aisle) is incredibly gullible in matters of national defence and economics. If any candidate for high national office suggests that the US is overspending on defence, he or she cannot get elected – despite the fact that the US spends several times more on arms than any other country and the Russian Federation, the purported “enemy” has never threatened to invade the West and has never been the aggressor (as explained here). And iIf a far off country elects a leader who makes statements opposing US “values” or supposedly abuses his people, the Shallow State (I do not mean all Americans, but the majority that accepts as Gospel the Establishment’s war narratives as recited in the msm) automatically and without further thought swallows the Establishment narrative that the country in question is an enemy that must be controlled with sanctions and threatened with bombs and bullets, and that all “free” nations must join the US in meting out this draconian punishment in the name of “humanity.” The issue for them is not subject to intellectual scrutiny or research. They allow the Deep State to impose the narrative including unproven assumptions based on anecdotal evidence or even on a total lack of evidence. For example, the Shallow State accepted without question that Bashar al-Assad is a bad actor who tortures his own people. The Shallow State did not ask for proof but accepted the word of Syrian opposition leaders who were clearly politically motivated and did not actively oppose terrorism. When the White Helmets, a group supposedly formed to rescue victims of the war but in reality closely allied to terrorists, claimed that Assad was attacking his people with toxic gas, the US Establishment, including Trump (he IS part of the Establishment) hawked this story to the media, the Trump camp, for the most part, immediately bought the story without further questions and accepted Trump’s senseless Tomahawk missile attack on Syrian forces, which were actually engaged in the fight against terrorism — though the Shallow State imagined the Syrian government troops to be just zombies blindly following a bad leader. (The truth behind the reports of “Assad chemical weapons” allegations is detailed here).
The strongest point in favour of war is always the desire to show God that the US is on His side, and that means serving the cult of “Christian” Zionism, which has almost completely taken over the US Evangelical church. Amazingly, they adhere firmly to this cult even though the words of Jesus do not support it and strongly militate against it (explanation here).
 
The Shallow State is hopelessly susceptible to all narratives that give it a chance to showcase its “patriotism.” But because it is shallow in terms of mentality and moral character, it never questions the leaders it has chosen, especially not Trump because it has been sold the narrative that he is opposed to the Deep State. Of course, if he were opposed to it in significant ways, then he would be opposed to the wars based on Deep State narratives. But the shallow people making up the Shallow State are incapable of seriously examining nuances and fine details, so they are eminently manipulable.
 
And therein lies the tragedy. The same applies to economic issues. The Shallow State, particularly its right wing, also accepts a certain number of assumptions about economics and government involvement in social issues. One of these assumptions is that any aspect of government that, in their minds, resembles socialism is dangerous. To the shallow minds of the Shallow State, the very mention of socialism conjures up images of emaciated prisoners in gulags. They are totally incapable of entertaining the possibility of a benevolent state in which health care is available to all, including the poor. To them, the notion of a state in which health care is a function of government is anathema. Such a state, they believe, would inevitably be totalitarian and inhumane, even though Canada, for example, is just such a state with health care available to the poor. They might complain a bit about the glaring gap between rich and poor, but as long as they have sufficient access to their calorie-rich food and a modest roof over their heads, they will automatically and unthinkingly praise capitalism, even though in reality, the predatory capitalism of Big Business and Big Banking have long displaced the benign system where an enterprising little guy with a few bucks and good credit can work his way to the top. These are the days of Corporate Culture, where the graduate of the right college who talks the right talk and walks the right walk can work his or her way up the corporate ladder. But woe unto the corporate candidate who questions the corporate machine and the government’s agenda du jour, and especially who questions the war and sanctions of the day or “Western values” regarding society and mores, as defended by social media moguls! He or she will be cast into outer darkness. Thus the denizens of the Shallow State unwittingly live in the very totalitarian state they fear when they suspect that billionaires might have to pay their fair share to the common kitty.
 
This lack of critical thinking and willingness to be led by their chosen hero, the Ivy League and the Establishment are why the US people could never accept a smoothly functioning and efficient economic system of the Chinese kind, wherein money must be earned with work, not conjured out of the air with the printing press.
 
Nothing of significance will change in the US until enough people feel the hunger.
 
It may not be far off.