From stevefulton on this Cracked article
All these are reason why, I believe, the "prequels" were not the actual stories, but propaganda stories created by Palpatine and his minions to make the Jedi look terrible and worthless. Midiclorians were created so that the rest of the people in the universe would not try to become Jedi, as they would "measure" their "Midiclorian level" and find that it was low or non-existent...because they don't exist. The Jedi in the stories and bumbling fools who can't see what is right in front of them. At the same time, they make Palapatine look like the smartest, most powerful in the universe. Who would ever want to mess with him? The "real" stories of the Clone Wars, etc. are yet to be told, and I'm pretty sure we will see them surface as a new trilogy very soon.