P. J. O'Rourke Quotes

[People] don't like the government telling them what to do or telling them how to live their lives.

Whatever the issue, let freedom offer us a hundred choices, instead of having government force one answer on everyone.

Since no one but you can know what's best for you, government control can't make your life better.

My thinking tends to be libertarian. That is, I oppose intrusions of the state into the private realm—as in abortion, sodomy, prostitution, pornography, drug use, or suicide, all of which I would strongly defend as matters of free choice in a representative democracy.

Those who want the Government to regulate matters of the mind and spirit are like men who are so afraid of being murdered that they commit suicide to avoid assassination.

We don't want a busybody government - a boss - that butts into our lives every chance it gets to tell us how to work, how to play, where to live and on and on.

I would much rather see responsibilities exercised by individuals than have them imposed by the government.

Who knows? Maybe my life belongs to God. Maybe it belongs to me. But I do know one thing: I'm damned if it belongs to the government.

I'm saying the federal government is taking away the freedom of Americans to make choices.

Whenever regulation increases, personal freedom decreases.

Everybody has their own free choice to do what they want.

The first principle of freedom is the right to go to hell in your own handbasket.

The Democrats and Republicans stand at two extremes, characterized by which parts of our lives they emphasize their desire to control. Libertarians reject both extremes in favor of the government leaving control of your life to you.

Those who created this country chose freedom. With all of its dangers. And do you know the riskiest part of that choice they made? They actually believed that we could be trusted to make up our own minds in the whirl of differing ideas. That we could be trusted to remain free, even when there were very, very seductive voices - taking advantage of our freedom of speech - who were trying to turn this country into the kind of place where the government could tell you what you can and cannot do.

Human beings have a right to change their consciousness, and it is unconscionable and absolutely wrong for any government or any person to stand in the way of someone choosing to change their consciousness.

The more the state "plans" the more difficult planning becomes for the individual.

My political philosophy as a libertarian says that government has no business intervening in any consensual private behavior. My professional ethic as a thinker and writer, however, says that self-knowledge is our ultimate responsibility

I do not believe that the government should have its long nose poked into the private consensual relationships between people.

Was the government to prescribe to us our medicine and diet, our bodies would be in such keeping as our souls are now.

Liberty is always freedom from the government.

What would happen to the individual if all the functions of the body were placed under the control of the consciousness is what would happen to a nation in which all individual activities were directed by government.

I went my direction, my direction is whatever I want to go.

All things being equal, letting people make decisions for themselves will produce smarter outcomes, collectively, than relying on government planners.

Libertarians argue that no normal adult has the right to impose choices on other normal adults, except in abnormal circumstances, such as when one person finds another unconscious and administers medical assistance or calls an ambulance.

I believe in the America people's ability to govern themselves. If government would just get out of the way and allow them to lead their lives as they choose, they will succeed.