The Republicans are fond of making fun of government bureaucracies.

[KlatooBNikto]

What seems to be left out is the equally inefficient corporate bureaucracies.Corporate bureaucracies govern our purse strings and are fiercely protective of their turf and the associated privileges.Because a corporation is a far cry from a democracy, people walk in fear because of the possible loss of jobs.

The inefficiency of a corporation comes about because a corporate bureaucracy requires redundancy in the workforce to get things accomplished.If a professional worker leaves, the need for someone else to fill his/her shoes is immediate.So, a corporation tends to pad its workforce having multiple workers doing what is essentailly the same job.I have seen this happen at a large corporation like GM.This creates pervasive insecurity among its professional staff.This insecurity, of course, is heightened by the economic forces outside the corporations over which the ordinary professional worker has no control.

All of these factors have produced a workforce that has to be obedient,do what the boss says unquestioningly in order to keep your paychecks coming.To me, after nearly three decades in a corporation, this more than anything else has contributed to the decline of our democracy.Although we are justly proud of our traditions of questioning authority, that tradition has been rendered meaningless over time as the economic underpinnings of the tradition are at risk.
Our biggest asset, our people, are becoming impotent even for the corporations that need their intelligence and drive for their survival.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. I fear there will be a complete economic meltdown here

as corporate heads, seeing greener pastures elsewhere, simply abandon the US. You see them getting ready for it now with their 'golden parachutes' made at the expense of thousands of workers. You see it in the mismanagement and cheating of corporate earnings figures, that hurt the general stockholder but enrich the CEOs. Lack of major indictments of crooks like Ken Lay and the stifling of dissent, like the CA pension commissioner who was fired, just shows that the greedy SOBs with no sense of social responsibility are in charge. They will continue to milk this country dry until there is nothing left, then go to another country to live in luxury. Hopefully no other nation will be stupid enough to let them get away with what they've done here.

[KlatooBNikto]

2. Several years ago another corporate CEO huckster called Michael

Dingman, engineered a leveraged buyout of his corporation, Wheelabrator Frye, for several billion dollars;gave himself a nice bonus of several hundred million dollars and simply moved to the Cayman Islands and changed his citizenship to avoid paying taxes in the U.S. His example is going to look more and more attractive to a lot of people who simply want to loot their own companies'assets and disappear.

[Bullshot]

3. Republicans may make fun of government bureaucracies,

but the Dept. of Homeland Security was formed under the watch of a Republican administration and Congress. EPA was formed under Nixon. USDA was formed under Lincoln. And the list goes on.

It's just like the stereotype of liberals being in bed with Hollywood celebrities. Republicans have many more Hollywood celebs in their corner, holding elected offices than the Dems do.

But, in today's society where people are too damned stupid or lazy to think for themselves, if you say something enough times, whether it's true or not, a percentage of the people will believe it.

[McKenzie]

4. corporations are the antithesis of democracy

I posted this link before though it's quite OT in the context of what you say in your message. The early Americans ( up until the late 19th century) tried to limit the power of corporations because the threat to democracy was recognised. We are moral beings and exercise moral choice in our actions. Corporations don't give a monkey's crutch piece about morality and generally operate on an amoral level.

http://dieoff.org/page12.htm

I have a theory that corporations are behind much of what is currently happening in geopolitics. We tend to focus on individuals such as the semi-literate oil spiv who is your president but the real power behind the throne lies in corporate hands...big mining, big logging etc. A couple of years ago the UK press ran a major article about how the spiteful actions of "big tobacco" made the Clinton-Lewinsky into such a big issue; bet it wasn't covered over the pond. When one looks at the matter objectively it becomes clear that to spend huge amounts of public money over a blow job and some hanky panky with a cigar was laughable to the point of being farcical. What a completely pointless diversion from the real issues facing the world. Most Europeans wouldn't give a toss about something that is integral to r/l but then I suspect around half the US adult population wouldn't either. Sexual morality scandals (sic) are just a smokescreen to divert attention away from the real issues and the power elite uses that to the full.

[KlatooBNikto]

5. I agree.There is no question that if the same scrutiny government

bureaucracies are subjected to is imposed on corporate bureaucracies, they will fare worse.These are euphemistically buried in restructuring reports produced by magnificently compensated consultants.Their job is usually to hide the fact that corporate managements don't know what they are doing and put a halo around the CEO's neck.