This is the United States of America,” declared President Obama to the burghers of Liberty, Mo., on Friday. “We’re not some banana republic.”

I can imagine Inigo Montoya sipping his rum. He contemplates, then chuckles. He pulls a bit on his mustache as President Obama’s teleprompter bromides blare out of his television. “He uses this phrase banana republic.” Inigo muses. “I do not think he knows what it means.”

You can use the term in a number of ways. As catchy bits of jargon get run through the political mill until shopworn, it’s perhaps quite accurate of Montoya to question whether anyone knows what banana republic means. I tend to think their clothes are overrated. My wife, on the other hand, always appreciates a $100 gift card. All jesting aside, when the American author O. Henry invented Archuria, he had a very specific type of dystopia in mind.

How does one recognize a banana republic worthy of The United Fruit trademark? Fred Reed gives us a good list of particulars to go by in an old blog post that he entitled Half-@$$&% in Haggledom. Fred Reed expostulates.

Suspected Economic Law: The easier it is to bribe a working-stiff cop, the poorer the country.

Does anyone believe that the USG is a fair-minded organization that works to make your life better? You’d be better off believing in Scientology or the Hale-Bopp Comet. Mark Steyn explains below.

Like to change that? Maybe advocate for less government spending? Hey, Lois Lerner’s IRS has got an audit with your name on it. The tax collectors of the United States treat you differently according to your political beliefs. That’s pure banana republic,….This week it emerged that senior Treasury officials, up to and including Turbotax Timmy Geithner, knew what was going on at least as early as spring 2012. But no one seems to mind very much. In the words of an insouciant headline writer at Government Executive ….back in May: “The Vast Majority of IRS Employees Aren’t Corrupt”

Reed plants the following axiom…

Suspected Economic Law: Prosperity varies inversely with the time between beginning negotiations to open a factory and getting first product.

One only needs to follow the fortunes of our massively-subsidized Green Energy boondoggles to see how America is going to the bananas on that one. ABC News recently described the ongoing taxpayer money-suction vortex known as Karma Fisker. Here’s where the future of our blessed planet stood as 2 Apr 2013.

“We are not offering any official comment on the speculation around bankruptcy at this stage,” Roger Ormisher, a spokesperson for the electric car company Fisker Automotive, told ABC News recently. Ormisher was responding to questions about reports last week that Fisker had hired a prominent law firm to advise it on possible bankruptcy proceedings. The Anaheim, Calif.-based company recently disclosed that it had furloughed non-essential U.S. workers in March, a move made as the company is “in the process of identifying a strategic partner… [but] continuing to manage its day-to-day operations,” Ormisher said.

Fred Reed suggested that people who cared about their future took care of their surroundings.

Suspected Economic Law: National income is inversely proportional to the amount of trash in the streets.

He may or may not have taken a drive through Detroit before he wrote that Suspected Economic law. So you think Detroit is just an outlier? Go drive through Bulletmore, Murderland instead. The Japanese successfully rebuilt Hiroshima. There is no excuse for the post-modern America inner city.

I’ll share one more of Fred’s Economic Laws.

Suspected Economic law: Per capita income correlates with the average number of minutes by which people miss appointments.

If The PPACA of 2009 is the signature achievement of Barack Obama’s Presidency, than the United States of America is much closer to needing protectionist agricultural tariffs for its non-existent banana industry than we would care to admit. If they ever put the implementation plan for this law on a Gantt chart; it was drawn with Crayolas. Fox News describes the fierce attendance and alacrity with which our Glorious Federal Government has enacted President Obama’s signature train-wreck.

The White House, according to the June report, did not meet nine of 12 deadlines from the first year after ObamaCare was enacted. It failed to meet 22 of 53 deadlines in the second year. In the third year, the administration missed 10 out of 17 deadlines. That’s a total of 41 out of 82 deadlines missed.

O. Henry, when he created the mythical State of Archuria, at least saw fit to populate it with an interesting cast of scoundrels. I’m looking at our version and see the likes of Joe Biden and Harry Reid. I’m hoping the United People’s Blogging Front of Archuria doesn’t read this post and hate RS.com for devaluing the proud tradition of The Banana Republic. O. Henry just turned over in his grave. That had to do a number on that perpetual hangover he was rumored to have taken to the hereafter.

Senor Inigo Montoya listens as Obama drones on. “Raising the debt ceiling, which has been done over a hundred times, does not increase our debt.” He placidly intones. It all sounds so reasonable. ‘They spend money they do not have and that does not exist.” Montoya says in awe. “Who would want to shut down a government like that?”