Quotes from P. J. O'Rourke

I know quite a few fellow members of the news analysis and commentary business, and I have it from the highest-placed sources, on the record, that each and every one of our children is a genius.

A little government and a little luck are necessary in life, but only a fool trusts either of them.

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.

Governments have monopolies on certain things, like eminent domain and deadly force.

You've got to understand, people are motivated by fun. And they should be.

We have the British motor industry as a role model for what happens when you try to save an industrial dinosaur. Britain was the first country to industrialise and the first to de-industrialise. We should learn from this.

I understand Twitter has become popular among politicians. This technology allows them to stay in perpetual contact with their constituents. The electorate now has instant information about what politicians have been up to.

We all know the types who listen to Pete Seeger songs; even Pete admits they aren't interesting.

Liberals want to live downtown. All over America - in New York, San Francisco, Chicago, Georgetown - there are crowds of liberals living in the gritty, ugly, dirty neighborhoods sensible people are trying to flee.

Russians not only vehemently despise blacks, they believe Africa begins at the Ukraine border.

Guns are the ultimate bulwark against government misbehavior.

Happy hour is slightly different in the Soviet Union. There are no ice cubes or orange-peel twists in the vodka. Also, it lasts all day.

I do have to travel a lot for speaking engagements.

My life would have gone along perfectly well, politically speaking, if it hadn't been for girls.

Corporate corruption has ecological merits. It's helping to preserve that species known as Democrats - thought to be endangered as recently as the year 2000.

Excessive speed and quantity are, like chattiness and digression, besetting sins of cyber-assisted authorship.

The world is being run by irresponsible spoiled brats.

Fascism is very much a mob movement.

America has to act. But, when America acts, other nations accuse us of being 'hegemonistic', of engaging in 'unilateralism', of behaving as if we're the only nation on earth that counts. We are.

Fiscal conservatism is just an easy way to express something that is a bit more difficult, which is that the size and scope of government, and really the size and scope of politics in our lives, has grown uncomfortable, unwieldy, intrusive and inefficient.

Soldiers are not policemen, and it's very unfair, even for those soldiers who have some police training, to burden them with police duties. It's not what they're trained for, or equipped for.

America's grossly unfair tax system won't lead to class war. Or, if it does, the war will be brief.

The District of Columbia is an extreme example of disconnect between financial input and educational outcome. Unfortunately, extreme is not the same as abnormal.

The very existence of the bicycle is an offense to reason and wisdom.