Smoke--I don't buy everything at the supermarket, but I believe the products exist. The great thing about conspiracy theories is that they cannot be proven either way, so they are the refuge of small minds. I claim that the whole universe is the dream of a dying flea--can't be proven either way.

polkadots--you're living in delusion. No country, if it had the power of the US, would have behaved much differently. Look at history and show me a more just and benevolent empire than America's.

You mention the British. When they were at their height, how many Asians and Africans died as a result of their cruelty and mismanagement? Because they liked sweet tea they pillaged Asia, enslaved Africans and destroyed the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean. These are the people that forced China to accept the opium trade (Opium Wars) and invented concentration camps for civilians in wartime (Boer War). Just ask the Irish at how well the British behave as an occupation force. It was the British idea to create Iraq in the last century as a country made up of warring factions so that they could more easily rule it.