If you look at the last ~40 years of government policy in the USA, and focus on where the Republicans and Democrats are in alignment (neoliberal trade policy &

If you look at the last ~40 years of government policy in the USA, and focus on where the Republicans and Democrats are in alignment (neoliberal trade policy & outsourcing of manufacturing, steadily increasing military-industrial budgets, and no-strings-attached bailouts of Wall Street firms), then you get a picture of the country as a corporation where the politicians are essentially little more than corporate middle managers. The middle manager has a rather unusual job - keep the corporate board and the shareholders wealthy and happy, and keep the rank-and-file employees productive and happy. The former job is done more in private, the latter job is done more in public. (Note how certain politicians notoriously stated the need for having both public and private positions, which fits this model). Somewhere along the way, the middle managers had a bright idea: if we ensure the rank-and-file employees distrust and hate one another more than either us or the corporate board, we can keep this whole thing rolling along, even while we screw them over and enrich ourselves and the board! Genius. For a while, anyway.