End of the 'Power" meme

This is a quickie pointing to another thread I want to spend some time exploring: the counter argument to the "power" meme. What I mean here is the sort of Nietzche-ian notion that power is a good thing and end in itself, or more properly the distortion of that to the "power is everything" argument.

As an idea of where I'm going, I despise the "philosophy" of the American Neo-Cons, all aspects of it, from the elitist Straussian belief in privileged understanding to the need for primacy of American power. Still, despising it doesn't make it necessarily false, incoherent or illogical. But, it seems to me, there is an argument against the notion of a singular exercise of power.

I want to argue that power for it's own sake is ultimately self-defeating, inasmuch as the power emanates from the totality of a system, and therefore the system's own survival and success is essential to having the power. The abuse of power, much as say an addiction to a narcotic, compromises the system's ability to continue to survive. In other words, addictions tend to end badly, and so too will the exercise of autocratic power in a democratic society. It may take time, but eventually the social and political system will rebel against anything which takes their support and uses it for irrelevant or harrmful purposes.

This isn't fully fleshed out or coherent, but it's 3:15 a.m. so I'm begging off for now. I hope it's enough to get some interest piqued, and I promise I'll be writing a lot more about this, with related research.