Failed State: A Portrait of California in the Twilight of Empire

California was once the crown jewel of the American dream: prosperous, innovative, egalitarian, and aspirational. Today, it stands as a dystopian warning of what happens when nihilistic, radical ideology consumes the foundations of governance. In Failed State, Christopher Moritz dissects the unraveling of the Golden State with the precision of a lawyer, the depth of a historian, and the heartbreak of a California native son who has witnessed its collapse firsthand. Through disturbing, relentless detail drawn from whistleblowers, law enforcement insiders, and classified reports, he exposes the corrosive and deadly impact of progressive policies that have prioritized criminals over victims, cartels over citizens, and ideological dogma over law and order.

Moritz reveals the architects of this catastrophe: rogue prosecutors bankrolled by anarchist billionaires, open-border zealots who have transformed California into a cartel haven, and policymakers who have gutted public safety in the name of equity. The 2025 Palisades Fire, a man-made disaster, epitomize this descent into chaos. Fire hydrants ran dry while organized looters turned evacuation zones into war zones. Resources were squandered on symbolic virtue-signaling as ordinary citizens were left defenseless in the face of destruction. These failures are not isolated--they are the inevitable result of policies designed to dismantle civic order and empower anarchic forces at the expense of law-abiding Americans.

Yet, Failed State is more than an autopsy of California’s collapse. Drawing on historical parallels--from the Bolshevik Revolution’s destruction of Christian Russia to the ethnic cleansing of Rhodesia by Mugabe’s communists--Moritz warns that California’s crisis is not contained to the Golden State. It is a harbinger for America’s future if these radical trends metastasize nationwide. His searing analysis reveals the systematic dismantling of civil society and the betrayal of a state’s duty to its citizens, all in service of an anti-civilization agenda cloaked in the language of progress.

Unflinching, provocative, and unapologetically honest, Failed State is a rallying cry for those who refuse to stand by as America’s most prosperous state spirals into lawlessness and disorder. For those seeking clarity amid chaos, Christopher Moritz delivers a blistering indictment of failed leadership and a warning that the unraveling of California could signal that unraveling of the nation itself.

Christopher Moritz is a corporate attorney, investment researcher, and M&A executive. A third-generation Santa Monican, he grew up in the heart of Southern California and resides in the same home his grandparents built in the 1950s. He attended Santa Monica High School and is a graduate of UCLA. He also holds an MPhil in Modern European History from the University of Cambridge. Chris attended New York University School of Law for his JD.

Chris’s career spans international finance, corporate strategy, and geopolitical risk. As a former vice president in cross-border M&A for one of China’s largest state-owned investment banks, he is one of the only Western executives to have navigated the opaque world of China’s state-banking sector from within. Later, as a White House-appointed senior advisor to the U.S. Department of Commerce under President Trump, Chris helped shape critical policies on foreign investments, technology transfer risks, and national security, confronting threats to America’s economic sovereignty.

With deep roots in California and a global career that spans corporate boardrooms and national security corridors, Chris brings a singular perspective to the intersection of crime, governance, and geopolitics.A recurring guest on Tucker Carlson’s show, Chris is known for his bold, uncompromising commentary on the crises eroding America’s civic fabric. His debut book, Failed State, is a searing indictment of California’s descent into chaos--a cautionary tale for the nation.