Wrangling over anti-bribery law rages on, with top firms facing investigation … The U.S. anti-bribery law that Wal-Mart may have violated in Mexico has ensnared leading companies from virtually every sector of the economy as federal prosecutors increasingly crack down on a wide range of transgressions, from improper accounting to giving foreign officials computers and bags of cash. The list of those facing federal bribery inquiries stretches well beyond 100 and includes prominent names such as Pfizer, 3M, Goldman Sachs and Alcoa. Even icons of corporate responsibility such as General Electric and IBM have paid hefty sums to settle allegations, part of a broader effort that has netted the government billions in fines in recent years and landed some executives in prison. – Washington Post

Dominant Social Theme: These corrupt multinationals need to be reined in. The US prosecutorial system is there to act, thank goodness.

Free-Market Analysis: There is a manufactured "surface" conversation in this world and then there is reality.

The reality is that a secretive power elite has taken over the West, seeks to rule the world and uses mercantilism to achieve its objectives.

Mercantilism is the usage of government laws and legislatures to achieve aims that advantage only a few who are basically in control behind the scenes.

This is the basic problem of modern regulatory democracy – which in its more aggressive postures is more oppressive for the larger polity than almost any monarchy.

Regulatory democracy seems to have been developed after the advent of the Gutenberg printing press rocked the powers-that-be, helped create the Renaissance, the Reformation and the republicanism and agrarianism of the New World.

The power elite is still developing and perfecting regulatory democracy and this article in the Washington Post regarding corporate bribery shows us why – and how. One needs to delve into the Way the World Really Works in the 21st to understand what's actually going on regarding US corporate (overseas) bribery.

On its surface, this move against multinational corporations would seem to many as a reasonable "attack on corruption." But one really needs to put it into a larger context.

The elites that want to run the world – and do pretty much control the West – use Western resources pretty much at will. There is no real "fairness" or "justice" as people would commonly describe it in the West's larger institutional facilities – legislative, judicial, corporatist or military.

Justice used to be a private decision, and people pursued it to the degree that they wished and could afford. In the modern system of so-called public justice, there is little that is left to individuals. If the state wants to prosecute, it does.

In the modern state, controlled by a handful of dynastic banking families, apparently, justice is entirely a public function. The state serves as rule maker, enforcer, policer, prosecutor, judge, jury, captor, etc.

It is an amazing tribute to the efficacy of mind control that people cannot perceive another way of distributing so-called justice but believe that the state's monopoly justice provides the best and fairest outcomes.

It does not, of course. State monopoly control of justice is just as destructive as, say, monopoly control of central banking.

Any time the state has a monopoly over anything the results are eventually disastrous. Private monopolies are different things. Private monopolies exist only so long as people tolerate them. Public monopolies survive via force so people have no say over them. Over time, they grow intolerably abusive.

The elites that control the state via mercantilism have tremendous power within this larger "justice" system as they are positioned above the state versus below it. They are virtually immune to the law.

Not only that, but it is increasingly evident and obvious that the elites use this justice formula to help enforce their will.

That's because there are very few elites and even with the control afforded by Money Power, the elites need the threat of real law enforcement to keep their people in line.

Most people, even at the top, don't likely understand they are simply cogs within a larger investment portfolio. The elites seem to control not just governments but the means of production as well – stock markets, financial instruments, monetary and fiscal instruments and, of course … corporations.

The lawlessness of the modern age seems to know no bounds. The elites, using NATO and coordinated national troops, attack countries at will. The use of poisonous depleted uranium is ubiquitous and has caused deformations throughout Iraq and increasingly in Afghanistan.

The elites' central banking system has blown up the world's economy and continues to cause great havoc and increasing worldwide depression. The combination of poverty, war and expanding authoritarianism is the proximate cause of much of the misery in the world.

The problems of modern times are the result of a globalist conspiracy that in its ambition and deviousness is probably unmatched in human history.

The attack on international corporatism should be seen in this light. The Western justice system is merely a formula for control. The UN, World Bank and BIS are involved in forms of bribery as part and parcel of their business practices.

The laws and lawful prosecution of multinationals are merely another way of keeping business moguls in line – reminding them of who they really work for. It's likely no coincidence that the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) came along in 1977 when American multinationals began to expand in a big way.

Did the elites need a club to ensure that their people stayed in line? And now, with a need to make sure that business gets blamed for the expansionist sins of central banking, the elites are at it again.

It's not easy to work within the ambit of a portfolio. While larger lawlessness rages around you, you – yourself – are apt to be targeted by the very bosses you putatively serve.

It's all part of the larger manipulation that you signed up to support.

"Live by the sword … die by the sword"?