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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

Some people think that welfare reform should have hurt Bill Clinton with black voters.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Black People Reformer Some Think Voter
To mistrust science and deny the validity of scientific method is to resign your job as a human. You’d better go look for work as a plant or wild animal.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Better Human Method Mistrust Resign Science Validity Work
Stupid is a great force in human affairs.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Affair Force Great Human Stupid
Once you’ve built the big machinery of political power, remember you won’t always be the one to run it.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Always Build Machinery Once One Political Remember Rum
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

Brilliant Everything Midwest Most Notice Proposal Satire Straightforward Time
Liberals have invented whole college majors – psychology, sociology and women’s studies – to prove that nothing is anybody’s fault.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Fault Invent Liberal Major Psychology Sociology Study Women
The best and brightest don’t go into politics. The best and brightest are at Goldman Sachs.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Best Bright Brightest Goldman Politics
I like fiction and the kind of history that gives the grace and flavor of fiction to the past. No bloviation on current events, please. I can write that junk myself.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Event Favour Fiction Grace History Kind Please Write
Explosion of positive rights started in 1932 with the election of Roosevelt.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Election Explosion Positive Right Started
Hubris is one of the great renewable resources.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Great Hubris One Renewable Resource
Family love is messy, clinging, and of an annoying and repetitive pattern, like bad wallpaper.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Bad Family Love Messy Pattern Wallpaper
Southern California is a nice place, if you could cut out the show-business cancer. It just keeps spreading.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Business Cancer Country Nice Place Show Southern Spread
The mystery of government is not how Washington works but how to make it stop.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Country Government Make Mystery People Stop
What Alexander Graham Bell thought up occupied less space than a flower vase. Now it’s so small that I have to search all my pockets to discover I’ve received a spam text.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Bell Flower Occupy Person Pocket Search Small Vase
Finland is a rich country. What have they got? They got Nokia phones and plywood. How’d they get so rich? Because they’re free.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Country Free Nokia Phone Plywood Rich
Maybe climate change is a threat, and maybe climate change has been tarted up by climatologists trolling for research grant cash. It doesn’t matter.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Cash Change Climate Climatologist Matter Maybe Research Threat Troll
Preachers at black churches are the last people left in the English-speaking world who know the schemes and tropes of classical rhetoric: parallelism, antithesis, epistrophe, synecdoche, metonymy, periphrasis, litotes – the whole bag of tricks.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Black Church Classical English People Preach Scheme Speak Troop
New Hampshire polling data are unreliable because, when you call the Granite State’s registered Republicans and independents in the middle of dinner and ask them who they’re going to vote for, they have a mouth full of mashed potatoes and you can’t understand what they say.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Independent New Poll Registered Republican Unreliable
The divorce rate in 1946 was higher than it ever had been and as high as it ever would be until the ’70s. The reason was that prior relationships had not endured the strain of war.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Divorce Prior Rate Reason Relation Seventy Until Veen
People will tell you anything but what they do is always the truth.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Always Anything People Tell Truth
Barack Obama is more irritating than the other nuisances on the Left.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Irritate Let More Nuisance Other President
Adam Smith’s huge failure was the fact that he did not foresee the industrial revolution.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Fact Failure Forces Huge Industrial People Revolution
My dad died when I was young; my mom remarried with more haste than sense to a fellow… he wasn’t evil or anything, but he was worthless.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Anything Dad Die Fellow Haste Marry Mom Sense Young
Some people have facts; these can be proven. Some people have theories; these can be disproven. But people with opinions are mindless and have their minds made up about it.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Dosproven Fact Mindless Opinion People Some
I’ve got a 1990 Porsche 911. It’s just a Carrera, a very simple, straightforward little thing that goes like stink. I love it.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Got Little Love Simple Straightforward Thing
Just because a subject is serious doesn’t mean it doesn’t have plenty of absurdities.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Just Mean Plenty Serious Subject
I was very much in favor of the Iraq invasion.
P. J. O'ROURKE

Country Favor Invasion Mush

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.

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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.

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Popular Authors

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