This extraordinary piece by Tom Engelhardt in today's Asia Times is a MUST read.

A scathing indictment of this administration's modus operandi of global destabilization and where it's lead us, this piece exposes the pathological depths of their madness and the extent to which they are willing to gamble the fate of all humanity in the off chance that they might emerge on top.
The top officials of this administration [have launched] a full-scale a program for the destabilization (as well as plundering) of this country, one that fits snugly with their operations potentially destabilizing the planet. And through it all, like the good cold warriors they are, they've never let up on that rollback campaign against Russia.

Perhaps, as in the previous century, if all that needed to be compared was the relative powers of two superpowers, their acts, however fierce or cruel, might not have seemed so strategically wrongheaded. Having taken advantage of the weaknesses of their opposite number, administration officials might now be standing tall; while the Russians, crimped, impoverished, embittered, might indeed have been licking their wounds, while complaining angrily but impotently.

Such is not the case. The twenty-first century is already turning out to be far more than a hyperpower, or even a two superpower, world. Before the eyes of much of humanity, between November 2001 and March 2003, the Bush administration decided to demonstrate its singular strength by playing its destabilization trump card and setting in motion the vaunted military power of the United States. To the amazement of almost all, that military, destructive as it proved to be, was stopped in its tracks by two of the less militarily impressive "powers" on this planet - Afghanistan and Iraq.

Before all eyes, including those of George, Dick, Don, Paul, Stephen, Condi, and their comrades, we visibly grew weaker. While the Bush administration was coveting what the Russians called their "near abroad" -- all those former SSRs around its rim -- and were eagerly peeling them away with "orange," "rose," and "tulip" revolutions, its own "near abroad" (what we used to like to call our Latin "backyard") was peeling away of its own accord, without the aid of a hostile superpower. This would once have been inconceivable, as would another reality - up-and-coming economic powers like China and India traveling to that same "backyard" looking for energy deals. And yet a destabilized planet invariably means a planet of opportunity for someone.You better believe that that 'someone' CONTROLS THE MONEY SUPPLY.