Capitalism is intent on its own destruction

I'm trying to riddle out something someone told me a long time ago: "Capitalism is destructive. It extracts value from things; it doesn't add value."
At the time, I wasn't really interested in having *any* discussion with this person and certainly not a political-economic discussion, but it stuck with me. And it's come back to haunt me lately.

Spurred on by my sister, who is in the financial world, I'm starting to consciously embrace the conspiracy theories that:
1. We (America) are under attack.
2. The genius of this attack is that we think we're doing this to ourselves.
3. Nothing less than the future of democracy is at stake.

Now, I'm not saying I completely agree with the above - I'm just sayin'... it's worth thinking about.

1. We are under attack.
Currency can be a weapon, especially if you can manipulate and devalue it. Say we want to destroy Communism. We have the bomb, they have the bomb - mutally assured destruction. But we could drive the price of oil up (since it's traded in US$) and make them pay more. We could do a lot of things to stop or interrupt the flow of capital in and out of Communist countries.

2. The genius of this attack is that we think we're doing this to ourselves.
We are primed to hate Wall Street and money-bag CEOs. It's their fault, right? Oh yeah - and predatory lenders, too. But what about the janitor who took out a $500,000 mortgage? Isn't he to blame, too, for borrowing more than he could reasonably afford?
This is where the attack, if there is one, is absolute genius. Because maybe Capitalism is intent on its own destruction after all? If you live in a Capitalist environment, it's just downright patriotic to want the house, the car, the college for your kids, the annual vacation to Orlando, and all the knick knacks from QVC you can buy.
But what if this is just some ultimate form of jujitsu, where our weaknesses are being used against us? Add a measure of currency manipulation and viola!

3. Nothing less than the future of democracy is at stake.
Maybe this is a good time to remind folks that democracy and capitalism are separate things. We can have democracy without capitalism. We'll have a thousand little city-states, but we'll have democracy.
Except we don't have democracy now. We have a republic. So maybe the city-states will be a little bigger. Let's say, for the sake of discussion, we separate into countries along state lines.
But why are we even talking about the dissolution of the union? Well - without capitalism driving our economy, we won't have a good reason to remain a union. Why would the monied Coasts support the poor South or Midwest? Why should the South help support the cold North in the winter by sending fruit and veg? We're going to hoard what we have and defend it.
In this post-democratic USA, I see the Madison Avenue American Spirit rising up to our own version of mutually assured destructions. Austin will want to secede from Texas. Vermont won't have a government at all, and will be ripe for plunder. Montana will be one big unibomber nation - but you just KNOW they're going to survive. They've been practicing for this forever.

Man, this would make a great novel. Too bad it may actually be happening.