The proliferation of support groups suggests to me that too many Americans are growing up in homes that do not contain a grandmoth.

By sending the contradictory message that the famous are just plain folks on Mount Olympus, America has forged a relentless tension between loftiness and accessibility. Stir in the fact that the inborn talent and intelligence needed to achieve fame are immune to distributive tinkering by government programs and you have a definition of fame certain to produce envious rage: somebody screwed democracy.

Americans worship creativity the way they worship physical beauty - as a way of enjoying elitism without guilt: God did it.

There are so many different kinds of people in America, with so many different boiling points, that we don't know how to fight with each other. The set piece that shapes and contains quarrels in homogeneous countries does not exist here. The Frenchman is an expert on the precise gradations of espèce de and the Italian knows exactly when to introduce the subject of his other's grave, but no American can be sure how or when another will react, so we zap each other with friendliness to neutralize potentially dangerous situations.

For men who want to flee Family Man America and never come back, there is a guaranteed solution: homosexuality is the new French Foreign Legion.

Why do I hate people? Who else is there to hate?

Let's bring back grandmothers! A real family consists of three generations. It's time Americans stopped worrying about interference and being a burden on the children and regrouped under one roof.