The Right proves, in short, that the liberal faith in the impeccable consistency and logic of the status quo is unfounded. They're almost like hackers saying, if this system is as secure as you say, how come we can break into it? Or, to put it another way, if your version of reality is the only version possible, how come it contains us? Karl Rove used to be mocked by liberals for saying, "We're an Empire now and, when we act, we create our own reality." The chaos in Iraq seemed to horrifyingly rebut this unspeakable smugness, but did it? Did they not create their own reality? Wasn't the chaos, the civil war, the patrimonial corruption, the torture, the complete social breakdown, the million bodies, their own reality?
—Richard Seymour

But I think this analysis should be a complement to "the confidence men" article although Seymour's use of "democracy" is close to that of  the Financial Times' and the Guardian's, for instance. More importantly, "the confidence men" piece lacks political economy.

England's rentier alliance