110+ P. J. O'Rourke Quotes On Liberals, Politics And Satirical

P. J. O'Rourke is an American political satirist and journalist. He is the author of numerous best-selling books, including Parliament of Whores and Give War a Chance. He is also a frequent guest on television and radio talk shows, and a contributing editor for The Atlantic and The Weekly Standard. Following is our collection on famous quotes by P. J. O'Rourke on liberals, politics, satirical.

Top 10 P. J. O'Rourke Quotes

1. Mercedes Benz : A mechanical device that increases sexual arousal in women.
2. Everybody knows how to raise children, except the people who have them.
3. There are a number of mechanical devices which increase sexual arousal, particularly in women. Chief among these is the Mercedes-Benz 380SL convertible.
4. At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.
5. Tabasco sauce is to bachelor cooking what forgiveness is to sin.
6. Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.
7. A firm, hearty handshake gives a good first impression, and you'll never be forgiven if you don't live up to it.
8. Even very young children need to be informed about dying. Explain the concept of death very carefully to your child. This will make threatening him with it much more effective.
9. A fruit is a vegetable with looks and money. Plus, if you let fruit rot, it turns into wine, something brussel sprouts never do.
10. There's a whiff of the lynch mob or the lemming migration about any overlarge concentration of like-thinking individuals, no matter how virtuous their cause.

P. J. O'Rourke Image Quotes

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

P. J. O'Rourke Short Quotes

• Let's reintroduce corporal punishment in the schools - and use it on the teachers.
• Walt is dead. And, after a couple of hours at Epcot, you'll wish you were, too.
• It's better to spend money like there's no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there's no money.
• Term limits aren't enough. We need jail.
• Never fight an inanimate object.
• The Three Branches of Government: Money, Television, and Bullshit
• If government were a product, selling it would be illegal.
• Every government is a parliament of whores. The trouble is, in a democracy, the whores are us.
• Cleanliness becomes more important when godliness is unlikely.
• I don't even know which end of a computer one is supposed to gaze into. I've never used a computer.

P. J. O'Rourke Quotes About Liberals

A little government and a little luck are necessary in life, but only a fool trusts either of them. — P. J. O'Rourke

There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you damn well please. — P. J. O'Rourke

Neither liberal nor conservative politicians can resist the temptation to stand as mighty sequoias of rectitude amid the lowly underbrush of fundraising. — P. J. O'Rourke

Liberals are always proposing perfectly insane ideas, laws that will make everybody happy, laws that will make everything right, make us live forever, and all be rich. Conservatives are never that stupid. — P. J. O'Rourke

Liberals have invented whole college majors - psychology, sociology and women's studies - to prove that nothing is anybody's fault. — P. J. O'Rourke

Global warming is a fact. Now it's up to liberals to make it a reality. Hence there is crucial importance in preventing powerful, greedy free market forces from getting in the way of worsening storms and rising sea levels. The Kyoto Accord is a good first step. — P. J. O'Rourke

Not being a liberal, I have very little grasp of things that I know nothing about. — P. J. O'Rourke

It's the squares who know how to fly the fighter planes and operate the missiles and the bombs and work the M-16s. Liberals would still be fumbling with the federally mandated trigger locks. — P. J. O'Rourke

Liberals consider people to be nuisances. — P. J. O'Rourke

No one has ever had a fantasy about being tied to a bed and sexually ravished by someone dressed as a liberal — P. J. O'Rourke

P. J. O'Rourke Quotes About Politics

Maybe a nation that consumes as much booze and dope as we do and has our kind of divorce statistics should pipe down about "character issues." — P. J. O'Rourke

The good news is that, according to the Obama administration, the rich will pay for everything. The bad news is that, according to the Obama administration, you're rich. — 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

When are the world's political parties going to get appropriate symbols: snake, louse, jackal, ... trash can, clown face, ... dollar bill with bat wings on it? — P. J. O'Rourke

One of these suburbs is actually named Stalingrad, which goes to show that the French have learned nothing about politics since they guillotined all the smart people in 1793. — P. J. O'Rourke

Smoking is very bad for you and should only be done because it looks so good. People who don't smoke have a terrible time finding something polite to do with their lips. — 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

Mankind is supposed to have evolved in the treetops. But I have examined my sense of balance, the prehensility of my various appendages, and my attitude toward standing on anything higher than, say, political principles, and I have concluded that, personally, I evolved in the backseat of a car. — P. J. O'Rourke

Politics are for foreigners with their endless wrongs and paltry rights. Politics are a lousy way to get things done. Politics are, like God's infinite mercy, a last resort. — P. J. O'Rourke

And, by the way, how come all the people who were so in favor of unilateral nuclear disarmament are so opposed to unilateral protection against nukes? — P. J. O'Rourke

P. J. O'Rourke Quotes About Satirical

There is parody, when you make fun of people who are smarter than you; satire, when you make fun of people who are richer than you; and burlesque, when you make fun of both while taking your clothes off. — P. J. O'Rourke

Satire doesn't effect change. — P. J. O'Rourke

The most brilliant satire of all time was 'A Modest Proposal' by Jonathan Swift. You'll notice how everything got straightened out in Ireland within days of that coming out. — P. J. O'Rourke

P. J. O'Rourke Quotes About People

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

You know, if government were a product, selling it would be illegal. Government is a health hazard. Governments have killed many more people than cigarettes or unbuckled seat belts ever have. — P. J. O'Rourke

Some people are better imagined in one's bed than found there in the morning. — P. J. O'Rourke

You can't get rid of poverty by giving people money. — P. J. O'Rourke

Cats possess so many of the same qualities as some poeple that it is often hard to tell the people and the cats apart. — P. J. O'Rourke

I remember thinking cocaine was subtle until I noticed I'd been awake for three weeks and didn't know any of the naked people passed out around me. — P. J. O'Rourke

These were people who believed everything about the Soviet Union was perfect, but they were bringing their own toilet paper. — P. J. O'Rourke

The poor of the world cannot be made rich by the redistribution of wealth. Poverty can't be eliminated by punishing people who've escaped poverty, taking their money and giving it as a reward to people who have failed to escape. — P. J. O'Rourke

There are no kinder or better people in the world than those who listen to you when you are 18. — P. J. O'Rourke

The whole idea of our government is this: If enough people get together and act in concert, they can take something and not pay for it. — P. J. O'Rourke

P. J. O'Rourke Quotes About World

With Epcot Center, the Disney corporation has accomplished something I didn't think possible in today's world. They have created a land of make-believe that's worse than regular life. — P. J. O'Rourke

At Epcot Center the Disney corporation has focused its attention on two things greatly in need of Disneyfication: the tedious future and the annoying whole wide world. — P. J. O'Rourke

The motorcycle is a device created by the team of God and Darwin to rid the world of useless young males. — P. J. O'Rourke

Automobiles are free of egotism, passion, prejudice and stupid ideas about where to have dinner. They are, literally, selfless. A world designed for automobiles instead of people would have wider streets, larger dining rooms, fewer stairs to climb and no smelly, dangerous subway stations. — P. J. O'Rourke

The Greenpeace booth at all the rock and roll shows nowadays are akin to the old sorcerers who used to stand in the middle of villages warning of danger, 'When night wolf swallows mother moon, there will be great famine.' — P. J. O'Rourke

What would be a road hazard anywhere else, in the Third World is probably the road. — P. J. O'Rourke

Marijuana is self-punishing. It makes you acutely sensitive, and in this world, what worse punishment could there be? — P. J. O'Rourke

To grasp the true meaning of socialism, imagine a world where everything is designed by the post office, even the sleaze. — P. J. O'Rourke

I had really not been out of the United States much, except for Mexico. I thought, "Jesus Christ, this [Russia] is like a whole new world." Instead of writing Michael Jackson one-glove jokes, all I had to do was go to these weird places and keep my eyes and ears open. — P. J. O'Rourke

Visiting Future World is like opening a Chinese fortune cookie to read, "Soon you'll be finished with dinner." — P. J. O'Rourke

P. J. O'Rourke Quotes About Life

In general, life is better than it has ever been, and if you think that, in the past, there was some golden age of pleasure and plenty to which you would, if you were able, transport yourself, let me say one single word : Dentistry. — P. J. O'Rourke

Now majority rule is a precious, sacred thing worth dying for. But like other precious, sacred things .... it's not only worth dying for; it can make you wish you were dead. Imagine if all life were determined by majority rule. Every meal would be a pizza. — P. J. O'Rourke

When a couple decides to divorce, they should inform both sets of parents before having a party and telling all their friends. This is not only courteous but practical. Parents may be very willing to pitch in with comments, criticism, and malicious gossip of their own to help the divorce along. — P. J. O'Rourke

The people I see on bicycles look like organic-gardening zealots who advocate federal regulation of bedtime and want American foreign policy to be dictated by UNICEF. These people should be confined. — P. J. O'Rourke

Greatest generation came through some stuff that we can't even imagine - the Depression, World War I - and all they wanted after that was a breather and a calm and a quiet life, and they get us. — P. J. O'Rourke

If I give up drinking, smoking, and fatty foods, I can add ten years to my life. Trouble is, I'll add it to the wrong end. — P. J. O'Rourke

A hat should be taken off when you greet a lady and left off for the rest of your life. Nothing looks more stupid than a hat. — P. J. O'Rourke

I realised the bohemian life was not for me. I would look around at my friends, living like starving artists, and wonder, 'Where's the art?' They weren't doing anything. And there was so much interesting stuff to do, so much fun to be had... maybe I could even quit renting. — P. J. O'Rourke

I have three children and three dogs. You put them in a Prius, you know? People who have a Prius obviously have no life! No wife, no kids, no pets - there's no room in there for anything! — P. J. O'Rourke

I've decided that my motto in life is "Get off my lawn." It's the right answer to everything. — P. J. O'Rourke

P. J. O'Rourke Quotes About Political

We also have a lot of the same influences - we both read a lot of the beatniks. And yet what we actually do is almost exactly the opposite. His [ Hunter S. Thompson] political stuff is just wonderful, but basically nothing happens. — P. J. O'Rourke

How did an allegedly free people spawn a vast, rampant cuttlefish of dominion with its tentacles in every orifice of the body politic? — P. J. O'Rourke

Politics is a necessary evil, or a necessary annoyance, a necessary conundrum. — P. J. O'Rourke

[Al] Franken is left-wing and funny. He's a pretty good political humorist. — P. J. O'Rourke

Anyhow, all mankind's ideas and interests, all human aims and motives, are exhibited, fully formed, in a three-year-old child. The kid is just operating on a smaller scale and lacks the advantage of having made enormous soft-money campaign contributions to political candidates. — P. J. O'Rourke

If there are three words that need to be used more in American journalism, commentary, politics, personal life... it's the magic words 'I don't know.' — P. J. O'Rourke

I am a student of stupidity. I am a political reporter. — P. J. O'Rourke

Even the most left-wing politicians worship wealth creation - as the political-action-committee collection plate is passed. — P. J. O'Rourke

No doubt the ridiculous politicians are right to like politics. They have found careers in which success can be achieved by being ridiculous. Imagine Jimmy Carter or George W. Bush rising to the top of any other profession. — P. J. O'Rourke

The baby boomers' politics have covered a wide band of silliness, from the Weather Underground to the Timothy McVeigh types. The great majority of us are well in the middle of that spectrum, but still, there's been both leftie silliness and right-wing silliness. — P. J. O'Rourke

P. J. O'Rourke Famous Quotes And Sayings

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

Children from the age of five to ten should watch more television. Television depicts adults as rotten SOB's given to fistfights, gunplay, and other mayhem. Kids who believe this about grownups aren't likely to argue about bedtime. — P. J. O'Rourke

When Adam Smith was being incomprehensible, he didn't have the luxury of brief, snappy technical terms as a shorthand for incoherence. — P. J. O'Rourke

It is a popular delusion that the government wastes vast amounts of money through inefficiency and sloth. Enormous effort and elaborate planning are required to waste this much money. — P. J. O'Rourke

Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work, and then they get elected and prove it. — P. J. O'Rourke

There is a remarkable breakdown of taste and intelligence at Christmastime. Mature, responsible grown men wear neckties made of holly leaves and drink alcoholic beverages with raw egg yolks and cottage cheese in them. — 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

Name me, if you can, a better feeling than the one you get when you've half a bottle of Chivas in the bag with a gram of coke up your nose and a teenage lovely pulling off her tube top in the next seat over while you're doing a hundred miles an hour in a suburban side street. — P. J. O'Rourke

In our brief national history we have shot four of our presidents, worried five of them to death, impeached one and hounded another out of office. And when all else fails, we hold an election and assassinate their character. — P. J. O'Rourke

Microeconomics is about money you don't have, and macroeconomics is about money the government is out of. — P. J. O'Rourke

I have, of all the inglorious things, a malignant hemorrhoid. What color bracelet does one wear for that? And where does one wear it? And what slogan is apropos? Perhaps that slogan can be sewn in needlepoint around the ruffle on a cover for my embarrassing little doughnut buttocks pillow. — P. J. O'Rourke

There's no telling what might have happened to our defense budget if Saddam Hussein hadn't invaded Kuwait that August and set everyone gearing up for World War II. Can we count on Saddam Hussein to come along every year and resolve our defense-policy debates? Given the history of the Middle East, it's possible. — P. J. O'Rourke

You can't get good Chinese takeout in China and Cuban cigars are rationed in Cuba. That's all you need to know about communism. — P. J. O'Rourke

Personally, I believe a rocking hammock, a good cigar, and a tall gin-and-tonic is the way to save the planet. — P. J. O'Rourke

The French are a smallish, monkey-looking bunch and not dressed any better, on average, than the citizens of Baltimore. True, you can sit outside in Paris and drink little cups of coffee, but why this is more stylish than sitting inside and drinking large glasses of whiskey I don't know. — P. J. O'Rourke

You can learn all about the human condition from covering the crime beat in a big city - you don't need to go to Beirut for that - but a foreign correspondent begins to understand poverty from a different perspective. — P. J. O'Rourke

El Salvador has the scenery of northern California and the climate of southern California plus - and this was a relief - no Californians. — P. J. O'Rourke

Feeling good about government is like looking on the bright side of any catastrophe. When you quit looking on the bright side, the catastrophe is still there. — P. J. O'Rourke

Family love is messy, clinging, and of an annoying and repetitive pattern, like bad wallpaper. — P. J. O'Rourke

If you are young and you drink a great deal it will spoil your health, slow your mind, make you fat - in other words, turn you into an adult. — P. J. O'Rourke

After all, what is your host's purpose in having a party? Surely not for you to enjoy yourself; if that were their sole purpose, they'd have simply sent champagne and women over to your place by taxi. — P. J. O'Rourke

I am a journalist and, under the modern journalist's code of Olympian objectivity (and total purity of motive), I am absolved of responsibility. We journalists don't have to step on roaches. All we have to do is turn on the kitchen light and watch the critters scurry. — P. J. O'Rourke

Hubris is one of the great renewable resources. — P. J. O'Rourke

I read good. I was an English major. — P. J. O'Rourke

The sport of skiing consists of wearing three thousand dollars worth of clothes and equipment and driving two hundred miles in the snow in order to stand around at a bar and get drunk. — P. J. O'Rourke

Seriousness is stupidity sent to college. — P. J. O'Rourke

In Western Australia they don't even know how to make that vital piece of sailboating equipment, the gin and tonic. — P. J. O'Rourke

Abstract anger is great for rhetorical carrying on. You can go on endlessly about the post office, but it doesn't mean you're mad at your mailman. — P. J. O'Rourke

I have a 10 year old at home, and she is always saying, 'That's not fair.' When she says that, I say, "Honey, you're cute; that's not fair. Your family is pretty well off; that's not fair. You were born in America; that's not fair. Honey, you had better pray to God that things don't start getting fair for you. — P. J. O'Rourke

Any random group of thirty Vietnamese women will contain a dozen who make Julia Roberts look like Lyle Lovett. — P. J. O'Rourke

Gay marriage acceptance is happening in the blink of an eye. — P. J. O'Rourke

Because of their size, parents may be difficult to discipline properly. — P. J. O'Rourke

The only really good vegetable is Tabasco sauce. Put Tabasco sauce in everything. Tabasco sauce is to bachelor cooking what forgiveness is to sin. The next best vegetable is the jalapeno pepper. It has the virtue of turning salads into practical jokes. — P. J. O'Rourke

Always read something that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it. — P. J. O'Rourke

Actually, there is no way of making vomiting courteous. You have to do the next best thing, which is to vomit in such a way that the story you tell about it later will be amusing. — P. J. O'Rourke

Even a band of angels can turn ugly and start looting if enough angels are unemployed and hanging around the Pearly Gates convinced that all the succubi own all the liquor stores in Heaven. — 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

One of the annoying things about believing in free will and individual responsibility is the difficulty of finding somebody to blame your problems on. And when you do find somebody, it's remarkable how often his picture turns up on your driver's license. — P. J. O'Rourke

Never wear anything that panics the cat. — P. J. O'Rourke

You can always reason with a German. You can always reason with a barnyard animal, too, for all the good it does. — P. J. O'Rourke

When you think of the good old days, think one word: dentistry. — P. J. O'Rourke

Humor is a terrific tool for explaining things, especially when what you're explaining is frightening or dull and complicated. — P. J. O'Rourke

Adam Smith pointed out that there were three things that make us more prosperous, in a general sort of way: freedom to pursue our own self-interest; specialization, which he called division of labor; and freedom of trade. — P. J. O'Rourke

The old woman was not only ugly with the ugliness age brings us all but showed signs of formidable ugliness by birth - pickle-jar chin, mainsail ears and a nose like a trigonometry problem. What's more, she had the deep frown and snit wrinkles that come from a lifetime of bad character. — P. J. O'Rourke

The proper behavior all through the holiday season is to be drunk. This drunkenness culminates on New Year's Eve, when you get so drunk you kiss the person you're married to. — 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

Making fun of born-again Christians is like hunting dairy cows with a high powered rifle and scope. — P. J. O'Rourke

Golf combines two favorite American pastimes: taking long walks and hitting things with a stick. — P. J. O'Rourke

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

Staying married may have long-term benefits. You can elicit much more sympathy from friends over a bad marriage than you ever can from a good divorce. — P. J. O'Rourke

The Democrats are the party that says government will make you smarter, taller, richer, and remove the crabgrass on your lawn. The Republicans are the party that says government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it. — P. J. O'Rourke

I was told to hand over my disposable lighter, to prevent, I suppose, any threat of "Do what I say or I'll light this Marlboro and you'll all die - in thirty years due to inhalation of secondhand smoke." — P. J. O'Rourke

France in August when you can travel through the entire country without encountering a single pesky Frenchman or being bothered with anything that's open for business. — P. J. O'Rourke

Zen martini: A martini with no vermouth at all. And no gin, either. — P. J. O'Rourke

Where self-interest is violently suppressed, it is replaced by a burdensome system of bureaucratic control which dries up the wellsprings of initiative and creativity. — P. J. O'Rourke

People think the free market is a philosophy, they think that it is a creed. It is none of those things. Free market is a bathroom scale, it is a measuring tape, it's simply a measurement. — P. J. O'Rourke

What about snipers?" I once asked someone. He said, "Oh, most of the snipers have automatic weapon. They arent very accurate. — P. J. O'Rourke

For toddlers I suggest leaving their mittens on year-round, indoors and out. That way they can't get into aspirin bottles, liquor cabinets, or boxes of kitchen matches. — P. J. O'Rourke

There are just two rules of governance in a free society: Mind your own business. Keep your hands to yourself. — P. J. O'Rourke

Gossip is what you say about the objects of flattery when they aren't present. — P. J. O'Rourke

The sky was so clear that the starlight cast shadows, and so many sparkles and glitters and glints appeared above us that it looked like something really expensive had been dropped and shattered in heaven - God's Steuben ashtray, maybe. — P. J. O'Rourke

My Grandmother wouldn't even speak the word Democrat if there were children in the room, she'd say Bastards instead. — P. J. O'Rourke

One of the problems with being a writer is that all of your idiocies are still in print somewhere. I strongly support paper recycling. — P. J. O'Rourke

Fretting about overpopulation, is a perfect guilt-free - indeed, sanctimonious - way for "progressives" to be racists. — P. J. O'Rourke

Life Lessons by P. J. O'Rourke

1. P.J. ORourke's comedic style and sharp wit can teach us to never take life too seriously and to always find the humor in any situation.
2. His willingness to challenge conventional wisdom and speak his mind can show us that it's important to think for ourselves and form our own opinions.
3. His self-deprecating humor can remind us that it's important to laugh at ourselves and not take ourselves too seriously.