A large part of me still sympathizes with the Empire, and if I hadto throw my hat in somewhere, I'd be an Imperial.
I get that it's a rather racist group of people, but if you look at the expanded universe you can begin to understand why the Empire would just start ignoring the other races opinions and just have them follow orders. Seriously, non humans are incredibly lazy compared to humans, which formed and spearheaded basically every relevant thing in Galactic history. Major alien involvement was rare and might have been limited to one or two go-getters. Besides, after Palpatine the Empire started to change for the better. They even started trying to wash their hands of the Sith lord.
One thing I found interesting about the rebellion is that it's foundation was very much a "rich man's club" of senators who, despite how they nobly tried to justify it, in my opinion just found the power that came with their priviledged positions withering away along with the stagnation that came with their idea of freedom. Seriously, fuck the republic, if the desires of one planet are enforced on disagreeing planet in the name of democracy because of some BS majority vote then it's not freedom is it? Say what you will about Imperial totalitarianism but at least they didn't use a veil with the word "freedom" on it to mislead the galaxy.
So I havn't been able to watch Star Wars the same way since TIE Fighter. It's also a sure sign of nerd-dom that I actually care enough to write all that.