The most powerful country in the world is on its way back to the Stone Age. They say, "We were elected by the gods to govern the planet." But the truth is that what counts is getting hold of the last oil reserves. Instead of finding alternative energy sources, we try to subjugate entire regions of the world. People do not understand that by doing this, the country is going to absolute ruin.

I came out of Capitol Hill. Well, that's just not an ordinary background for a writer of the ordinary American sort.

I'd like to see a revival of state legislatures, in which I am a true Jeffersonian.

When you come from a family that has been political, and I was brought up by my grandfather in the Senate, my father was in Roosevelt's Cabinet, this is not the class that produces writers or reflective people.

It doesn't actually make any difference whether the President is Republican or Democrat. The genius of the American ruling class is that it has been able to make the people think that they have had something to do with the electing of presidents for 200 years when they've had absolutely nothing to say about the candidates or the policies or the way the country is run.

At any given moment, public opinion is a chaos of superstition, misinformation, and prejudice.

You can improve your talent, but your talent is a given, a mysterious constant. You must make it the best of its kind.