Igor Panarin's Doomsday Tea Party

One ex-KGB analyst has been warning for years that the US will collapse in 2010. Conservative activists think he may be on to something.

—By Nick Baumann

Thu November 5, 2009 3:03 AM PST

For more than a decade Dr. Igor Panarin, a Russian academic, has been predicting that sometime around 2010 the United States will collapse, splintering into separate states, some of them controlled by foreign powers. Outside of Russia, no one's put much stock in his crackpot and stereotype-based theories—until now, that is. Who are the newest members of the Igor Panarin fan club? Tea partiers who’ve rallied against the Obama administration's policies and blasted the president for pushing a "socialist" agenda. And he's especially big among tea party activists in Texas, who have hosted Panarin and promoted his work.