That was an interesting read, it reminds me of this interview by Bill Moyers with Mike Lofgren, a congressional staffer for 28 years: To the more cynical political observers, and in spite of all the red-state/blue-state bloviations, the ideological separation between republicans and democrats is insufficient for any true "democracy" to take place in the US. I was in high school for pretty much the entirety of G. W. Bush's first term and I think during that time I still had a conception of the US two party system which represented opposing viewpoints and fundamentally different values. It wasn't until college when I saw the shift from neoconservative leadership, to neoliberal leadership, culminating with Obama's election and Pelosi/Reid's congress, that I began to realize mainstream Republicans and Democrats play fiddle to very similar moneyed interests, particularly with respect to economics and foreign policy. There are a few social dogbone issues tossed into the pit of public debate for them to loudly scuffle over, but many other issues of public policy are either quietly agreed upon with bipartisan support, or hamstrung by a handful of influential key players. To try and identify a specific origin of this Deep State power is difficult, but I think the author takes a fairly safe stab, mentioning the Washington/New York axis. I think any sort of extreme concentrations of wealth lend themselves to backroom power. It really is my biggest issue with Clinton as a presidential candidate, she is very clearly a part of the deep state; I don't think I would have put two and two together at the time, but she was New York's senator for a while, and her role in the state department only solidified that for me. I look at the Benghazi scandal, and to me, that has Deep State written all over it, considering the allegations that the State Department was helping cover the CIA's transfer of weapons from Libyan rebels to Syrian rebels, of course now known as ISIS.What makes the deep state so successful? It wins no matter who is in power, by creating bipartisan-supported money pits within the system.