The reason that democracies always defeat dictatorships is because they're open to debate. We should never allow Washington to say, 'Shut up, get in line and wave the flag.'

I always say there's no ticket of admission for active citizenship. Anybody can get through that gate, and anybody can ask that basic question that gets the ball rolling.

Ours is a system of corporate socialism, where companies capitalize their profits and socialize their losses…in effect, they tax you for their accidents, bungling, boondoggles, and mismanagement, just like a government. We should be able to deselect them.

The 'democracy gap' in our politics and elections spells a deep sense of powerlessness by people who drop out, do not vote, or listlessly vote for the 'least worst' every four years and then wonder why after every cycle the 'least worst' gets worse.

You should not allow yourself the luxuries of discouragement of despair. Bounce back immediately, and welcome the adversity because it produces harder thinking and harder drive to get to the objective.

Congress is the great enabler, constitutionally, for progressive society, and it's the great graveyard, the way it's been behaving, against a prosperous society, or another billionaire or two.

Families are incubators for citizen activists.