It may be that America has become too big and complicated for most people to deal with being part of. People are longing for a smaller, stupider reality.

Over the years, many in the public have become numb to news of financial corruption, partly because too many of these stories involve banker-on-banker crime.

Having lived in a collapsed empire before - I lived in Russia right after the Soviet Union collapsed - you can see a lot of the classic signs of an empire that's on its way out.

To Wall Street, a firm like BP isn't just a profitable energy company with lots of assets like oil rigs and pipelines and gas stations - it's also a corporation that routinely borrows hundreds of millions of dollars to keep its business up and running.

The party in power almost always unapologetically engages in deficit spending, while the other party argues passionately against the evils of debt and deficits.

Our leaders know we’re turning into a giant ghetto and they are taking every last hubcap they can get their hands on before the rest of us wake up and realize what’s happened.

I mean, people who say that the Tea Party isn't a grassroots movement, I think, are incorrect. I think in some respects, it is a grassroots movement.