What a difference a year makes.

Washington changes people...Americans' disdain and apathy toward the political process have grown as we have watched one champion of "change" after another drink the Beltway Kool-Aid, "grow in office," and join the Washington establishment.

-South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint, Now or Never: Saving America From Economic Collapse (New York: Center Street Books, January, 2012), at p. 205.

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Today, U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) announced that he will leave the Senate at the beginning of January to become the next president of The Heritage Foundation, the largest and most respected conservative think tank in America.

-South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint, Senate Office press release, December 6, 2012.

DeMint has declined to say whether he will collect his $37,000 a year congressional pension after he turns 62 next year. His predecessor at the Heritage Foundation, Ed Fuelner, is paid almost $1 million a year.