P. J. O'Rourke Quotes

Sloths move at the speed of congressional debate but with greater deliberation and less noise.

Saigon is like all the other great modern cities of the world. It's the mess left from people getting rich.

Remember, FDA employees are serious about fear. We pay these people to panic about an iota of rodent hair in our chili, even when the recipe calls for it. FDA employees are first-class agonizers, world champions at losing sleep. When Meryl Streep got hysterical about Alar, they actually checked the apples instead of Meryl's head.

Politics is the business of getting power and privilege without possessing merit. A politician is anyone who asks individuals to surrender part of their liberty— their power and privilege— to State, Masses, Mankind, Planet Earth, or whatever. This state, those masses, that mankind, and the planet will then be run by ... politicians.

Personally, I believe a rocking hammock, a good cigar, and a tall gin-and-tonic is the way to save the planet.

People with a mission to save the earth want the earth to seem worse than it is so their mission will look more important.

People who are wise, good, smart, skillful, or hardworking don't need politics, they have jobs.

One thing that's certain about going outdoors: When you come back inside, you'll be scratching.

On Friday, June 12, 1992, 110 heads of state gathered at Riocentro. They were indistinguishable in dress and deportment. Where was biodiversity when we needed it?

Of course, the humans in Haiti have hope. They hope to leave.

Most of the research about species extinction has been conducted on islands because islands are controlled environments and scientists can get drinks with little umbrellas in them there... Island logic also tells us that an increase in habitat size means an increase in number of species. But it doesn't necessarily. You can build your bed as large as you like and still get very few people to sleep with you.

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.

Man has been breeding livestock for ten thousand years and has yet to come up with a monstrous sheep that can trample buildings and graze a whole golf course for breakfast.

"Malthus,", says Vice President Al Gore in Earth in the Balance, "was right in predicting that the population would grow geometrically." Al, as the father of four children, should know.

It's hard to come back from the Balkans and not sound like a Pete Seeger song.