# Is there a deep state or cabal \[spelling corrected\] that is controlling the government? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 21, 2021, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336 "2021-03-21T02:38:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2021, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/121 "2021-03-27T16:21:13Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > I heard a stat that China buys the most Budweiser That’s just sad. Those poor Chinese beer-drinkers. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2021, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/122 "2021-03-27T16:25:16Z")
Yep. As I’ve said before on the Dope, if a waiter tells me they have “Budweiser and …”, there’s no need to let him/her finish, I want the other one. ---
**Author:** ![snoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/43a26b/32.png) [@snoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snoe)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/123 "2021-03-30T04:08:07Z")
I know this thread isn’t _really_ about the Deep State in its, er, classical sense — not anymore, anyway— but I wanted to recommend a fictional portrayal of its analogue in Cold War-era Britain. In the 1988 TV series _A Very British Coup_, a radical socialist is elected PM, and forces within the unelected government— the various civil services and the military— conspire to derail his premiership. (Some are ideologically opposed, others have been corrupted by the plutocrats. The whole thing’s abetted by the plutes’ pet media organs.) I haven’t seen it in probably 30 years, but I remember it being scarily plausible and quite fun in a (British) _House of Cards_-y way. JustWatch says it’s streaming on Prime Video; think I’ll give it a reassessment. ---
**Author:** ![Jillwood77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e47c2d/32.png) [@Jillwood77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jillwood77)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 11:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/124 "2021-03-30T11:12:50Z")
You mean how the businesses are giving money to the colleges and universities. And the economic classes and political classes the textbooks and professors are telling the students we are all in a service sector economy now and the factories are never going come back. With out the middle class being destroyed and high inflation. Yet in the 40s to mid 70s most people did not even get a high school diploma and bought a house in their 20s and big SUV and living in the suburbs. So I will like the professors to tell the people and also the US government why there was one of the strongest middle classes in US history and no inflation for factories making goods in the US. ---
**Author:** ![Jillwood77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e47c2d/32.png) [@Jillwood77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jillwood77)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 11:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/125 "2021-03-30T11:15:09Z")
So why does most other countries have a much better trade deal than the US? With the US trade deal the trade debt will never get paid. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/126 "2021-03-30T11:18:15Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > Yep. As I’ve said before on the Dope, if a waiter tells me they have “Budweiser and …”, there’s no need to let him/her finish, I want the other one. - What if the other one is Coors Light? ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 11:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/127 "2021-03-30T11:26:49Z")
I think there’s some physical law against two such negative liquids being brought together? I thankfully have never been anywhere where those were the two only options. ---
**Author:** ![Telemark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/telemark/32/372_2.png) [@Telemark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Telemark)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/128 "2021-03-30T11:59:55Z")
> [@Jillwood77](#): > > With the US trade deal the trade debt will never get paid. A trade deficit isn’t a debt. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/129 "2021-03-30T12:49:12Z")
> [@Jillwood77](#): > > With out the middle class being destroyed and high inflation. Yet in the 40s to mid 70s most people did not even get a high school diploma Yes, they did. In 1940, the proportion who got a high school diploma was about 50%. The proportion moved steadily up to about 80% by 1975. The jobs in 1940 requiring high school diplomas was less than 50% in 1940. Since then the kinds of jobs available has changed. That’s what has happened pretty much everywhere in the world. There is not a high rate of inflation at the moment. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/130 "2021-03-30T12:50:14Z")
> [@Jillwood77](#): > > most other countries have a much better trade deal than the US Give us a citation that most other countries have a much better trade deal than the U.S. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [March 30, 2021, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/131 "2021-03-30T12:55:39Z")
> [@Jillwood77](#): > > With the US trade deal the trade debt will never get paid. Please explain in detail how the United States “gets paid” under an international trade agreement. ---
**Author:** ![Jillwood77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e47c2d/32.png) [@Jillwood77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jillwood77)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/132 "2021-04-07T07:35:12Z")
Well I don’t have the time to read all the replies here. But the odd thing is the most religious part of the US is the deep south and they really go out of there way to help big businesses over small and medium businesses. And Europe is the least religious than the US and they have stricter monopoly laws than the US. I just read all new smart phones are not allowed to default to google search. And any thing you buy have to give you three year warranty. The nordic countries have the largest welfare state in the world. So it is very strange. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/133 "2021-04-07T07:47:13Z")
> [@Jillwood77](#): > > So why does most other countries have a much better trade deal than the US? Who told you this? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 7:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/134 "2021-04-07T07:51:03Z")
> [@Jillwood77](#): > > Well I don’t have the time to read all the replies here. Do you have time to respond directly to any of them, instead of piling on even more factish statements on top of the ones already posted? Tying any of them into the supposed premise of this thread would be peachy keen, btw. ---
**Author:** ![Jillwood77](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e47c2d/32.png) [@Jillwood77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jillwood77)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 9:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/135 "2021-04-07T09:10:46Z")
I mean China is getting rich of US trade but the US is in debt to China. And the debt is getting bigger every year. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 9:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/136 "2021-04-07T09:36:24Z")
There is no trade “debt”. There’s a trade _deficit_, but that doesn’t mean what you seem to think it does – it does not mean the US owes money to China, or gave away money to China, and the deficit is in about the right place considering the relative GDP per capita of the respective countries and their markets’ size. I’m aware that a certain orange person may have told you otherwise, but, and this may surprise you, he’s not actually an expert on macroeconomics (or anything else). ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 9:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/137 "2021-04-07T09:46:26Z")
> **[Who Owns the US National Debt?](https://www.thebalancemoney.com/who-owns-the-u-s-national-debt-3306124)** > > The majority of the U.S. national debt is owned by Social Security, the Federal Reserve, and foreign investors. Learn how that impacts the economy and you. The US _is_ in debt to China. The same way it’s in debt to _anyone_ who buys Treasury Bonds. > Foreign: $7.07 trillion (in September 2020, Japan owned $1.28 trillion and [China owned $1.06 trillion of U.S. debt](https://www.thebalance.com/u-s-debt-to-china-how-much-does-it-own-3306355), which is more than a third of foreign holdings. Note the total debt is 28. 1 trillion. China owns roughly 3.6% of the total. ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/138 "2021-04-07T09:50:11Z")
Yes it’s good to point out that of the US national debt, only a tiny fraction is owned by Chinese investors and some 70% is owned by US investors. But to clarify, I was talking about [Jillwood77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jillwood77)’s notion of a “trade debt”. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/139 "2021-04-07T09:50:51Z")
> [@Jillwood77](#): > > I mean China is getting rich of US trade but the US is in debt to China. And the debt is getting bigger every year. Except that the electric blankets launched on Christmas morning don’t boil their Volvos all the way through the goalposts. It’s be much better if Madonna drowned the bricklayer’s paintbrush in purple goat knuckles. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 9:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336/140 "2021-04-07T09:54:07Z")
> [@Mijin](#): > > But to clarify, I was talking about [Jillwood77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jillwood77)’s notion of a “trade debt”. - I think she was confused between a trade deficit and China owning US debt. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-deep-state-or-cabal-spelling-corrected-that-is-controlling-the-government/938336.md?page=8)