The Communist bloc of old was a study in the failure of failure. Losers in the Soviet economy were the people at the end of the long lines for consumer goods. Worse losers were the people who had spent hours getting to the head of the line, only to be told that the goods were unavailable.
P. J. O'ROURKEBy the end of the 1950s, American cars were so reliable that their reliability went without saying even in car ads. Thousands of them bear testimony to this today, still running on the roads of Cuba though fueled with nationalized Venezuelan gasoline and maintained with spit and haywire.
More P. J. O'Rourke Quotes
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If we heard that somebody starved to death in Sweden or Switzerland, we would be shocked.
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Wealth brings great benefits to the world. Rich people are heros.
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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.
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Computers seem a little too adaptively flexible, like the strange natives, odd societies, and head cases we study in the social sciences. There’s more opposable thumb in the digital world than I care for; it’s awfully close to human.
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Call a man ‘ignorant,’ and you have license to show the world your vast fund of knowledge and wise him up.
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Politics is the attempt to achieve power and prestige without merit.
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Arab-led Islamic fundamentalism destabilizes nations from Algeria to the Philippines.
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Russians not only vehemently despise blacks, they believe Africa begins at the Ukraine border.
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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.
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Everybody is xenophobic to an extent.
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Gossip is what you say about the objects of flattery when they aren’t present.
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Because of their size, parents may be difficult to discipline properly.
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I come from Toledo, Ohio, a town that has been hurt badly by the shift of the automobile business towards Japan. And yet I remember how the car workers lived in the neighborhood that I grew up in. My father was a car salesman, and I remember how we lived. I remember how modestly we lived.
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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.
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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