"In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens, you can bet it was planned that way." -- Franklin D. Roosevelt
This is a version of the POSIWID principle. For an example of its use, look at the way Jeff Gates uses it to explain some dysfunctional behaviour of the American economic system, and also to explain how few Americans are worried by this. He writes: "one must wonder if this lack of concern is by design".
"Given the model's foreseeable results, any objective observer must conclude that present-day results are intentional. If so, policy-makers are complicit. Either that or the results are unintended, suggesting that policy-makers are incompetent. Take your pick: clueless or corrupt."
Jeff Gates, We the Unreasonable, Tikkun, July/August 2003
Jeff Gates, Transgenerational Financial Terrorism, Alternet, August 2003.
Jeff Gates, The OnePercenters, Adbusters (date?)
See also Kevin Alfred Strom, Is it All an Accident?. Free Speech, March 1995
