We were to be forever at war with somebody. We were going to fight communism everywhere on earth even if it didn't threaten us. It was a holy war, just as we've made one on terrorism and Islam, equally stupid and equally irrelevant.

I don't seem to be cynical to myself but how what I say goes down with others is their problem. I'm realistic.

The hatred Americans have for their own government is pathological, if understandable. At one level it is simply thwarted greed: since our religion is making a buck, giving a part of that buck to any government is an act against nature.

Most lives are spent putting on and taking off masks.

One of the most fascinating aspects of politician-watching is trying to determine to what extent any politician believes what he says.

If [drugs] didn't exist, our government would have to invent them, the better to enact laws aimed at keeping the citizens "sinless and obedient."

American writers want to be not good but great; and so are neither.