Patrick O'Rourke
| Born | November 14, 1947 Toledo, Ohio |
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The repository contains 18 quotes from P. J. O’Rourke.
Education • Intelligence • Sports
The difference between individual intelligence and group intelligence is the difference between Harvard University and the Harvard University football team.
Economics is an entire scientific discipline of not knowing what you’re talking about.
A woman should dress to attract attention. To attract the most attention, a woman should either be nude or wearing something as expensive as getting her nude is going to be.
Never refuse wine. It is an odd but universally held opinion that anyone who doesn’t drink must be an alcoholic.
Guns are always the best method for private suicide. Drugs are too chancy. You might miscalculate the dosage and just have a good time.
It’s better to spend money like there’s no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there’s no money.
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’s nothing in the mall and if you don’t go there they shoot you.
In order to understand the stock market we have to realize that, like anything enormous and inert, it’s fundamentally stable, and, like anything emotion-driven, it’s volatile as hell. Got that? Me neither.
Reading about economics after watching a lot of economic activity is like reading the assembly instructions after the Christmas toy has been put together. Certain significant patterns begin to take shape in the mind, even though the instructions are still gibberish and the toy doesn’t work.
Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.
Luck • Politics and Government
A little government and a little luck are necessary in life, but only a fool trusts either of them.
There’s a part of the human psyche that’s never satisfied with the chunks of an Archduke at Sarajevo and has to have a World War I.
One of the problems with being a writer is that all of your idiocies are still in print somewhere. I strongly support paper recycling.
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.
There are just two rules of governance in a free society: mind your own business, and keep your hands to yourself.
Doctors and Health • Politics and Government
If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it’s free.
If government were a product, selling it would be illegal.
Distracting a politician from governing is like distracting a bear from eating your baby.
