After all, Wall Street is clearly the most powerful lobbying force on Capitol Hill. From 1998 through 2008, the financial sector spent over $5 billion in lobbying and campaign contributions to deregulate Wall Street.

We have two and half million individual campaign contributions, more than any campaign in history.

Super PACs and a corrupt campaign finance system are destroying American democracy. We're proud that we have received four million individual contributions, more than any candidate in American history at this point.

The Republican I ran against, at the end of the campaign, had decided that I was "a friend of terrorists" and "a friend of pedophiles." That's the kind of crap they came out with. I expect that's the kind of crap they'll come out with again.

I am proud of the campaign that we ran. Obviously, I wish we could have done a little bit better.

This is what oligarchy looks like: Today, the top one-tenth of 1 percent owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent. The top one-hundredth of 1 percent makes more than 40 percent of all campaign contributions. The billionaire class owns the political system and reaps the benefits from it.