P. J. O'Rourke Quotes

It's hard not to get down on the government when you see dysfunction play out on our TVs every day. Frankly, sometimes at every level of government.

It's interesting to play a politician who gets stuff done.

Like they said about The West Wing, you can't do a show about Washington until you can.

People need to understand that in Washington, the process is the punishment.

I'm not a policy wonk, and I don't dream of being a political operative.

I hate politics and what are considered their appropriate measures. I hate notoriety, public meetings, public speeches, caucuses and everything that I know of which is apparently the necessary incident of politics - except doing public work to the best of my ability.

It is morally, politically and socially wrong for business as business or labor as labor to participate directly in politics.

Either one lives 'for' politics or one lives 'off' politics.

Public policy has been a passion of mine. For three decades, I've had some involvement in the political process.

Labor organizations had been the victims of so much political trickery that we felt that the only way to keep this new organization free from taint was to exclude all political partisan action.

Corporate power in the political process is a reality.... Why violate the law by bribing public officials when there are legal and more traditional methods of persuasion that are more effective? Among these methods are campaign contributions, advertising, lobbying, and government-business job exchanges.

I did not love politics. As a matter of fact, I hated politics. I loved governing which is … a different thing.

The Republicans are the party that says that government doen't work, and then they get elected and prove it.

I taught policy and politics for seven years at a university. I told my students lobbyists are not a bad thing; they're absolutely vital.

The big umbrella issue is, do I make a bigger difference on the outside of political process or on the inside?

The bureaucracy always goes with the way politicians go.

Politics and acting are very closely tied. The job is to convince.

When politics enter into municipal government, nothing resulting therefrom in the way of crimes and infamies is then incredible. It actually enables one to accept and believe the impossible.

Politics is social work with power.

The high-minded definition of politics is: 'the art or science of government; the art or science concerned with guiding or influencing governmental policy.' It is only when you keep reading in Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary that you get closer to the truth: 'political activities characterized by artful and often dishonest practices'.

There is nothing so bad that politics cannot make it worse.

I do politics in order to do policy.

The case to be made is that we have got to get people involved - continue to get people involved in the political process at every level.

I'll be active in politics through PACs at a later date.

I am not fond of speaking about politics because I don't have in my possession an army of 200,000 soldiers.