P.J. O'Rourke > Quotes

“Always read stuff that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Freedom is not empowerment. Empowerment is what the Serbs have in Bosnia. Anybody can grab a gun and be empowered. It's not entitlement. An entitlement is what people on welfare get, and how free are they? It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights -- the "right" to education, the "right" to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery -- hay and a barn for human cattle. There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“You know your children are growing up when they stop asking you where they came from and refuse to tell you where they're going.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“No drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If we're looking for the source of our troubles, we shouldn't test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Everybody knows how to raise children, except the people who have them.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Cats are to dogs what modern people are to the people we used to have. Cats are slimmer, cleaner, more attractive, disloyal, and lazy. It's easy to understand why the cat has eclipsed the dog as modern America's favorite pet. People like pets to possess the same qualities they do. Cats are irresponsible and recognize no authority, yet are completely dependent on others for their material needs. Cats cannot be made to do anything useful. Cats are mean for the fun of it. In fact, cats possess so many of the same qualities as some people (expensive girlfriends, for instance) that it's often hard to tell the people and the cats apart.”
― P.J. O'Rourke, Modern Manners: An Etiquette Book for Rude People

“Everybody wants to save the world but nobody wants to help mom with the dishes.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Drugs have taught an entire generation of kids the metric system”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. And with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Everybody wants to save the Earth; nobody wants to help Mom do the dishes.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“We had a choice between Democrats who couldn't learn from the past and Republicans who couldn't stop living in it...”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“The second item in the liberal creed, after self-righteousness, is unaccountability. Liberals have invented whole college majors--psychology, sociology, women's studies--to prove that nothing is anybody's fault. No one is fond of taking responsibility for his actions, but consider how much you'd have to hate free will to come up with a political platform that advocates killing unborn babies but not convicted murderers. A callous pragmatist might favor abortion and capital punishment. A devout Christian would sanction neither. But it takes years of therapy to arrive at the liberal view.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“The average IQ in America is—and this can be proven mathematically—average.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“The free market is ugly and stupid, like going to the mall; the unfree market is just as ugly and just as stupid, except there is nothing in the mall and if you don't go there they shoot you.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“When buying and selling are controlled by legislation, the first things to be bought and sold are legislators.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“The weirder you're going to behave, the more normal you should look. It works in reverse, too. When I see a kid with three or four rings in his nose, I know there is absolutely nothing extraordinary about that person.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“It's better to spend money like there's no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there's no money.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Never wear anything that panics the cat.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“America wasn't founded so that we could all be better. America was founded so we could all be anything we damned well pleased.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Authority has always attracted the lowest elements in the human race. All through history, mankind has been bullied by scum. Those who lord it over their fellows and toss commands in every direction and would boss the grass in the meadow about which way to bend in the wind are the most depraved kind of prostitutes. They will submit to any indignity, perform any vile act, do anything to achieve power. The worst off-sloughings of the planet are the ingredients of sovereignty. Every government is a parliament of whores. The trouble is, in a democracy the whores are us.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“A hat should be taken off when greeting a lady, and left off the rest of your life. Nothing looks more stupid than a hat.”
― P.J. O'Rourke, Modern Manners: An Etiquette Book for Rude People

“There is no virtue in compulsory government charity, and there is no virtue in advocating it. A politician who portrays himself as "caring" and "sensitive" because he wants to expand the government's charitable programs is merely saying that he's willing to try to do good with other people's money. Well, who isn't? And a voter who takes pride in supporting such programs is telling us that he'll do good with his own money -- if a gun is held to his head.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Guns are always the best method for a private suicide. They are more stylish looking than single-edged razor blades and natural gas has got so expensive. Drugs are too chancy. You might miscalculate the dosage and just have a good time.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“The college idealists who fill the ranks of the environmental movement seem willing to do absolutely anything to save the biosphere, except take science courses and learn something about it.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“There are a number of mechanical devices which increase sexual arousal, particularly in women. Chief among these is the Mercedes-Benz 380SL convertible.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“The Clinton administration launched an attack on people in Texas because those people were religious nuts with guns. Hell, this country was founded by religious nuts with guns. Who does Bill Clinton think stepped ashore on Plymouth Rock?”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“People are all exactly alike. There's no such thing as a race and barely such a thing as an ethnic group. If we were dogs, we'd be the same breed. George Bush and an Australian Aborigine have fewer differences than a Lhasa apso and a toy fox terrier. A Japanese raised in Riyadh would be an Arab. A Zulu raised in New Rochelle would be an orthodontist. People are all the same, though their circumstances differ terribly.”
― P.J. O'Rourke

“Anyway, no drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If we're looking for the source of our troubles, we shouldn't test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power. ”
― P.J. O'Rourke