Product Description
Red State. Blue State. Republicans. Democrats. Bailout. Stimulus. Health Care Reform. Blah blah blah. Has there ever been a moment where politics have sucked any more?

Don’t Vote – It Just Encourages the Bastards is a brilliant, disturbing, hilarious, and
ultimately sobering look at why politics and politicians are a necessary evil — but only just barely necessary. P. J. presents his Sex, Death, and Boredom Theory of Politics, which breaks the social contract down to power, freedom, and responsibility by using a party game, Kill, F@#k, Marry, more typically found in late-night giggle sessions at all-girls boarding schools.

With this tripartite lens of politics, O’Rourke looks at the financial crisis (“The best investment I’ve made lately? I left a $20 bill in the pocket of my tweed jacket last spring, and I just found it”), the bailout, health care reform (“Something doesn’t add up. Politicians are telling me that I can smoke, drink, gain two hundred pounds, then win an iron man triathlon at age ninety-five”), the stimulus package, climate change (“There’s not a god-damn thing you can do about it . . . There are 1.3 billion people in China and they all want a Buick”), trade imbalance, the end of the American automobile industry, U.S. foreign policy and the Family of Nations (“Uncle Russia’s out on parole, drunk, unemployed, and likely to kill some folks next door again soon”), campaign finance reform, gun control, No Child Left Behind (“What if they deserve to be left behind?”), and pretty much everything else under the sun.

His findings: Put the country’s big, fat political ass on a diet. Lose that drooping deficit. Slim those spreading entitlement programs. Firm up that flabby pair of butt cheeks, which are the Senate and the House.

Listen to P. J. O’Rourke on the pathetic nature of politics and laugh through your tears or — what the hell — just laugh.
... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

A great read
I lean a bit to the conservative side so most of the views expressed by the author fit right with my own anyway, but I really, really enjoyed the way he put them.Mr. O'Roark has quite a way with words.Honestly, I think I'd have enjoyed this book even if it were liberal.It's a very non-traditional point of view of some very traditional beliefs told with a "unique" vocabulary.I highly recommend it!Even if you don't agree with all the points, I think you'll enjoy the way they are made.

Bought this after hearing an author interview
It was a good purchase, well worth reading.

American politics are dominated by news bites and slices of incomplete information and people that vote often lack a basic understanding of economic principles or in my opinion much logic.P.J. O'Rourke writes a line about what is wrong with politics, half the voters are less than average intelligence.

Using sarcasm and lots of analogies, he writes short examples of why certain political issues are often carried to absurdity, states like California with strict gun laws have lots of murders while those with very lax laws don't, for example, and also that we should probably have vote control because voting leads to politicians taking us into war which leads for far more deaths caused by guns.

He writes about the futility of much of the left and right ranting (radio, books, etc.) because it's like preaching to the little old ladies wearing white hats in the choir.

I enjoyed how he worded the observation that we allow 19 year old's to vote, but we don't trust them with a beer.

Just because he uses lots of tongue-in-cheek humor, sarcasm, and analogies that could be seen as over the top in there usage, he is obviously a well read and well informed and well connected person and his writing is crisp and straight forward.Much of the chapters read like part of a conversation with a neighbor over a beer while bar-b-cuing some burgers.Good old fashioned complaining about how stupid so much of the American political scene is, was, and will be for the foreseeable future.

He points out that taxes make Republicans, logic makes libertarians and having children makes conservatives.It's interesting in my own observations, and I think that he writes a bit about this too, is that people tend to live their own lives as they see fit (libertarianism at its core) but that they often want to force others to do things for their own good.

I think both lefties and righties could gain something from a thoughtful reading of this book, certainly libertarians would enjoy it, although, his own words about preaching to the choir ring partially true here.

There is a great bit of discussion in this book directed at our current mess and the administration in the White House, I found is critique spot on.There is a lot in here about economics and the national debt and spending, perhaps this is is the most important discussion in any political discussion these days, one that is over looked or soft footed about.It is far too important a discussion to dismiss, and should be required knowledge before one is allowed to vote.Good luck with that wish, of course.

I give this book a strong recommendation before this upcoming election or any in the future for that matter.

Not as good as Parliament of Whores, but still a fun read
For my money Parliament of Whores: A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government is a great satire of politics, and should be required reading for US high school students as a civics text.At least the reader can laugh and also learn a few things.In that book, among other things P.J. explains what really happened with the savings & loan crisis in the 80s, and also wraps up with a meditation on why government is morally wrong.

Don't Vote is not in the same league but is still good for learning and laughs.The book is a collection of short topical essays, which can be read in any order.The climate change chapter (which consists of one page) is a brilliant, succinct reality check on the human condition.There is a bit of recycling from prior works, but at least the author admits it in the preface.So you have been warned.

And the largely libertarian author equally skewers both Republicans and Democrats for the current sad state of politics, and also offers a few simple pointers for improving our lot.Read and enjoy!

Don't Vote, Get This Book
P.J. O'Rourke's Parliament of Whores: A Lone Humorist Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government was one of the books that most influenced my political upbringing. It was a book that explained why American politics was so incredibly messed up, and was relentless in making fun of that fact. Even though it's almost 20 years old, it's still a classic, and well worth reading.

Well, P.J. O'Rourke's at it again. He's written a virtual sequel to Parliament of Whores that shows that in the intervening 18 years American politics has managed to become even more screwed up. And there's no one better suited to lampooning the state of American politics than P.J. O'Rourke.

But what separates this book from the many other books of political satire is that O'Rourke isn't just a bomb-throwing satirist. When, just a few pages in, O'Rourke is name-checking Michael Oakeshott, you know you're reading the work of an author who's done his homework. This book is a satire, to be sure, but it's an intelligent and thoughtful satire. This book manages to mix Oakeshott, Adam Smith, and a schoolgirl's game of "Kill, F@#$, Marry" into a devastating and intelligent critique of American politics. O'Rourke's takes on everything from health care reform to the national debt, and manages to skewer these hot-button political issues without coming across as preachy or pedantic.

O'Rourke is America's best political satirist - because he's America's most well-read and intelligent political satirist. This book, like Parliament of Whores, is destined to be a classic that will still be readable and worthwhile in 20 years -- while other political satires have long since been sent to the remainder bin.

And the Kindle edition is reasonably priced too, which makes this a must-download for this election cycle and long after.

O'Rourke at his best!
I just happened to buy this book at the airport yesterday before a 4 hour flight. I recognized O'Rourke's name, picked it up, read a couple of paragraphs and decided to plop down the $25 cover price. I had every intention of reading it later in the week, as I was too tired and needed to nap on the plane. Well, I couldn't put it down! I read the entire book! He is witty, incredibly intelligent and even charming in his criticism of our political system and the state of disarray it's in. I may start referring to this as "the new Libertarian manifesto!" Read the chapter on Global Climate Change (where O'Rourke challenges you to go tell 1.2 billion Chinese people that they can't have a car, old stove or fireplace because we think it might be causing the Earth to get warmer) and, if you're anything like me, you'll be hooked! ... Read more

Product Description
The author of Give War a Chance offers a hilarious guide to domestic life, covering the arts of cooking, cleaning, and housekeeping for people who do not know how to do any of these things and who refuse to learn. Original." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (20)

Hits a little close to home sometimes
I've read this book several times.Every time I pick it up, I end up laughing until I almost cry.As a bachelor myself, I relate to the grains of reality underneath O'Rouke's great sarcasm.

One of P.J.'s earliest works, and one of his best.
Not as good as "Eat The Rich" or "Parliament of Whores" or "All The Trouble in the World" or "Holidays in Hell" or "Give War A Chance"; those books are thought-provoking as well as screamingly funny. This one is just screamingly funny, but this might actually be a plus for people whose response to some of P.J.'s better works is a defensive "That's not funny!"; P.J. has a tendancy to poke fun at EVERYTHING, including the sacred cows of people who he disagrees with (and sometimes those he agrees with.)

Hands down one of his best!
I've been on a tear of P.J. O'Rourke's books lately, starting with Republican Party Reptile and so forth. This is by far one of P.J.'s best. I'm on the other side of the coin politically (fairly liberal) myself, but P.J. usually spares no one, and I admire that (Rush and his wacko friends could learn a thing or two).

This book is just about how to get by if you're a bachelor. It's incredibly funny for the most part (the cooking sections should not be read if you've just ate!). This is a fantastic little book, very helpful if you plan to live like a slob or like a typical college freshman.

The Bachelor Home Companion
The Bachelor Home Companion:A Practical Guide to Keeping House Like A Pig written by P.J. O'Rourke is a very funny, keep you in stiches book.

You'll never keep a house neat and tidy after you read this book.Of Course, that's assuming that you already do.What its like as a bachelor in theory as to actually being one is,according to O'Rourke, a great disparity.If you want to laugh and be entertained at the same time then this little tome is for you to enjoy.

Humor abounds and your life will definately take a turn... for better or worse will depend on you.According to O'Rourke... "How often does a house need to be cleaned, anyway?As a general rule, once every girlfriend.After that she can get to know the real you."

Celebrate Testosterone!
As a 32 yr old bacelor, this book had me literally HOWLING with laughter! I let my girlfriend read it. We aren't dating anymore, LOL. As ridiculous and as obscene as some of it seems, it is startling to realize that I have actually LIVED like that!

FIVE STARS,..!!!!!! ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (19)

Polonius Meets the Joker
Here's a book which falls most ungracefully between two stools. On the one hand it purports to be a synopsis of a tome which, though important, few have mustered the fortitude to slog through, and on the other hand it's another display of P. J. O'Rourke's puerile and facile wit. Each page will display a few sentences from Adam Smith, the significance of which are sometimes difficult to fathom, as it seems as though only the most banal and obvious platitudes have been chosen - e.g., "Vice is always capricious: virtue only is regular and orderly." - followed by a wisecrack from P. J., usually at the expense of a Democrat or reporter (the usual suspects).

For example, on page 38 he writes, "And Book 5 is Smith's attempt to apply his ideas to solving the problems of government. But since problems are the only excuse for government, solving them is out of the question." O.k., after stopping to reflect on that, I suppose that by "But since problems are the only excuse for government, solving them is out of the question," he cynically means that governments operate like a crooked mechanic who deliberately makes shoddy repairs so that you will be forced to return and give him more business, but such smug asides do nothing to elucidate Smith's ideas. It's like attending an economics lecture and having the misfortune to sit in front of the class clown who keeps blurting out the same jokes over and over.

The book becomes more readable beginning with Chapter 8, where there are fewer of P. J.'s zingers, and I learned that, according to Smith, a trade imbalance between nations - such as the enormous trade deficit between the USA and China at present - is of no consequence. That's nice to know, but the explanation offered seems incomplete and somehow unsatisfying - like being assured that the iceberg ahead poses no danger. I'd like to learn more, but O'Rourke rushes off to a similarly superficial discussion of the next topic.

To his credit, O'Rourke is fair and balanced in that his chosen quotations from Chairman Adam often fly in the face of Libertarian dogma - e.g., "Every tax, however, is to the person who pays it a badge, not of slavery, but of liberty. It denotes that he is subject to government, indeed, but that, as he has some property, he cannot himself be the property of a master," (sentiments which O'Rourke judges to be "slightly demented") or "The mean rapacity, the monopolizing spirit of merchants and manufacturers, who neither are, or ought to be, the rulers of mankind . . ." - and he often illustrates how Smith was plain wrong or even contradicts himself; so much so that it seems that Smith was merely one who happened to notice that the expanding commerce was a vast improvement over the recent feudalism of his time. In all other respects, he comes off as just a sententious old windbag - though not nearly as tedious as O'Rourke.

Could have been so much more
As an economics teacher, Adam Smith's "An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations" has long been on my "to read" list. I downloaded a free copy of it to my Kindle e-reader, but I haven't seriously considered opening it. I've read summaries of his ideas, perused his quotes and espoused his ideas in class, but I have not had the gumption to read 600 pages of 18th century prose.

When I discovered P.J. O'Rourke had written a commentary on the book I was thrilled. I do enjoy most of what O'Rourke writes and I figured his funny, insightful sarcastic take on things should do quite a bit to punch up a nearly 225 year-old economics text.

Let's start with the basics. Adam Smith (1723-1790) was a professor of both Moral Philosophy and Logic at the University of Glasgow in Scotland. He wrote two books, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (Penguin Classics) (1759) and The Wealth of Nations (1776), usually abbreviated "The Wealth of Nations", often considered to be one of the first books on modern economics. Smith argued that freedom, both political and economic, was the ultimate source of happiness because the "invisible hand" of the free market would regulate the market and provide the best living for the most amount of people as possible. It is an interesting coincidence that the American Revolution and The Wealth of Nations both debuted in 1776.

I picked up P.J. O'Rourke's commentary on Smith's two books (the title and the cover do not tell the reader, but O'Rourke actually makes commentary on both books - he makes the compelling argument that they are really inter-related) and was expecting big things out of a very small book (242 pages including index, bibliography, endnotes and several pages of selected quotations).

Unfortunately, I did not get very big things. O'Rourke's pizzaz and razmataz, his quick wit and his inclination to make a smart comment about everything - traits that can be very endearing and that I enjoyed very much in his book Peace Kills: America's Fun New Imperialismgot in the way big time. For example when discussing Smith's arguments about the value of importing goods and how free trade is a good thing. This is a controversial topic even now, more than 200 years later and O'Rourke adds nothing to it - in fact he hurts the argument by noting: "...imports are Christmas morning; exports are January's MasterCard bill." (p. 24)

If O'Rourke would have toned down the comments (Note: not eliminate, just tone down), this book would have been much more useful. As it was, I sometimes felt like I was reading Dave Barry's Dave Barry Slept Here: A Sort of History of the United States. The attempt to leaven the dry nature of Smith's original work with jokes failed - I just had to work too hard to seperate the facts from the jokes.

Did I learn enough about Smith and his thoughts to avoid that feeling of failure I get when I see "The Wealth of Nations" on my Kindle? Probably, so the book was not a complete failure. However, I feel like the book was a missed opportunity. The right man was picked to write this book, but he was allowed to play around a little too much.

Adam Smith humor, the best kind.
I've been aware of P.J. O'Rourke since his days at N. Lampoon and seen his work in Rolling
Stone so I assumed he was a leftist and having lost my earlier fascination with Communism, didn't read much of his work.
I began exploring the Wealth of Nations when I became aware, in 2008, of the folly that is the Federal Reserve System.
I have always assumed that the economy was a confidence game, as when people lost confidence in the economy that it would crash.
I didn't realize that it was a total con-job.
This was the first book I'd read by Mr. O'Rourke. I am now an avid fan.
The author is hilarious, making even the mundane and long winded treatment of real economics that Adam Smith explained, out load funny.
I was so impressed with this book that I've read many of the Authors earlier and recent works.
Mr. O'Rourke covers the The Wealth of Nations as seen from this side of the Keynesian debacle.
If you want a good review of the Wealth of Nations, without most of the extraneous material, coupled with laugh out loud satire of the current deviant financial system, then buy this book.
It is a serious book, on a serious subject and does convey the essences of Smiths life's work, but it does so in a humorous manner that goes a long way in re-popularizing Adam Smith's important work.

Relevant
My sister got this book for me while in Orlando last year 2009.It was signed by O'Rourke.I guess she knows me well.I have always been a fan of Adam Smith and have even dove into The Wealth of Nations in my youth.It's like going into the Grand Canyon, to massive of a landscape.P.J. O'Rourke has made The Wealth of Nations a joy to comprehend, and it is so relevant to current history making times that this is a must read.P.J. O'Rourke filled my youth with laughter and my older age with knowledge.What an amazing ability.

A new must-have for any library
I have two copies of this book; one in paperback, and I just downloaded another copy to my kindle.Why? Because this book is so dense (the good kind of dense!) with information and food for thought, I found myself thinking about some of the issues and concepts P.J. presented after reading a selection and wanted to reference passages often.It is the kind of book that makes you go "hmmmm."

The book is rich with concepts and people that I had learned about in my undergrad political science classes -- the people who are the foundation of this country.Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, Plato, etc.Fascinating.

The gem of this book is that PJ O'Rourke uses humor and an extensive vocabulary to bring the old world ideas and compare it to our 21st century.What other scholarly type work uses Britney Spears as an example in explaining "The Wealth of Nations?"

The book is timely as I write this in 2010, though the book was written before the current banking crisis.In the section "Central Banking for Dummies," he explains the whys and why nots of regulating banks.A primer I wish everyone in both administrations had read before TARP and AIG.

The best way of explaining why you should read this book from O'Rourke to learn about Adam Smith is because, in O'Rourke's words, WEALTH OF NATIONS is one of the "...Works Which Let's Admit You'll Never Read the Whole Of..."Exactly.

Strongly recommend to everyone. ... Read more

Product Description
In the spirit of his savagely funny and national best-seller Parliament of Whores, Give War a Chance is P. J. O'Rourke's number one New York Times best-selling follow-up. O'Rourke runs hilariously amok by tackling the death of Communism, sanctimonious liberals, and America's perennial bad guy Saddam Hussein in a series of classic dispatches from his coverage of the 1991 Gulf War. Here is our most mordant and unnervingly funny political satirist on: Kuwait City after the Gulf War: "It looked like all the worst rock bands in the world had stayed there at the same time." On Saddam Hussein, O'Rourke muses: "He's got chemical weapons filled with ... chemicals. Maybe he's got The Bomb. And missiles that can reach Riyadh, Tel Aviv, Spokane. Stock up on nonperishable foodstuffs. Grab those Diet Coke cans you were supposed to take to the recycling center and fill them up with home heating oil. Bury the Hummel figurines in the yard. We're all going to die. Details at eleven." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

shorter review
"Give War a Chance" is a very entertaining book.The book contains a bunch of loose stories about various subjects ranging from communism, to hippies, the 1st Gulf War, how stupid the Carters were, and how evil the Kennedys were.

My favorite three chapters were:
The chapter about democracy taking over in Nicaragua.
The chapter about Dr Ruth.
The chapter about how evil the Kennedy Clan was, and is.

There were also interesting tales about the first gulf war.

great title, laugh out loud humor
The title is brilliant, his humor just right, and I always appreciate a fellow libertarian.

Mostly, his book is common sense. War is often a necessary evil that has produced more peace than anything else. Rich taxpayers and the Marine Corps do more for world peace than the 1% of Ben & Jerry's profits that are set aside for that purpose - but then that's stating the obvious, isn't it?

Plus, always relying on diplomacy is naïve, unrealistic (remember Hitler?).People are inherently evil, not good.

And I never knew that O'Rourke used to be a "long-haired peace creep" back in the 60s, although it makes him more authentic. He's been on the Other Side, so he knows what they believe firsthand, making him an excellent critic, far more knowledgable than people who have been either strict liberals or strict conservatives for their entire lives. A "reliable narrator."

A Funny look back in time
A solid and very funny look at the crazy folks of the 3rd world. I really enjoyed this man's work and his wickly funny observations about this crazy old world of ours.

Give me a break
Typical O'Rourke drivel. Heres how it goes.PJ gets Rolling Stone to pay to send him to Lebanon, Panama (circa Noriega) and some other places where they have lots of guns and bad manners and little of anything else, in the hopes that he will get drunk enough to wander out from the hotel bar, see some "bad stuff" and come up with something funny to say about it. His humor is pointed and well placed at times. Most of the time though he, merely, uses the humor to set up some libertarian screed. Heavy reliance on Cato institute,intern-toadies(who fact check, research and do the academic heavy lifting) at times gives O'Rourke the appearance of knowing his arse from a hole in the ground....do not be fooled. PJ is a Hunter Thompson wannabe, but who lacks HT'S gonads. SKIP IT.

I laughed out loud!
This book is insightful, witty, and hilarious.O'Rourke certainly has a biased point of view and glosses over any argument that would say he's wrong (while insulting his opponents, often personally and unfairly), but he makes a strong case for war, capitalism, and freedom.

Some of his comments during the 1991 Gulf War regarding the differences between Sunni and Shiite Muslims seem out of date given September 11, but are interesting nonetheless.I wouldn't have expected someone in the Gulf at that time to see what was coming.

He does a great job of exposing the evils of communism and extolling the virtues of fighting against tyranny.Enjoy! ... Read more

Product Description
In the tradition of his contemporary classic Parliament of Whores, the man who The Wall Street Journal calls "the funniest writer in America" is back with Eat the Rich, in which he takes on the global economy. P. J. O'Rourke leads you on an hysterical whirlwind world tour from the "good capitalism" of Wall Street to the "bad socialism" of Cuba in search of the answer to an age-old question: "Why do some places prosper and thrive, while others just suck?" With stops in Albania, Sweden, Hong Kong, Moscow, and Tanzania, P.J. brings along his incomparable wit and finds hilarity wherever he goes.Amazon.com Review
What is it that makes one person rich and another poor? It's atough question and not one generally suited to laughs, butP.J. O'Rourke--in the audio version of his ironic and insightful book,Eat the Rich--is a master at finding humor in the most unlikelyplaces. Here he travels from Wall Street to Russia, Hong Kong to Cubaon an immensely entertaining quest for economic enlightenment. It's aneducational journey wrapped in hilarity, which is especially enjoyablewhen heard in the surprisingly deep, resonant voice of the authorhimself. (Running time: three hours, two cassettes) --GeorgeLaney ... Read more

Customer Reviews (115)

Travel is broadening
And it helps you understand that economics cannot be divorced from culture. Equal parts entertaining, due to the author's encounters at the far ends of the earth, and educational, as he explains how conditions developed there as a consequence of cultural forces meeting economic theories.

Started off alright, went downhill fast toward the end.
A muddled, myopic, and relatively juvenile interpretation of economics.Eat the Rich presents a simplistic and rosy picture of Libertarian and laissez-faire ideas without delving into even the most obvious and well documented negatives of those systems (ie, negative externalities). The somewhat gushing praise of free markets and Friedman-esque oversimplification of Adam Smith presented by O'Rourke seem all the more silly in the light of our recent economic crisis. Read How Markets Fail for a much more interesting, intelligent, and in-depth analysis of unfettered free markets.

Hilarious, and informative
This book could not be funnier. COULD NOT BE FUNNIER.

And, to top that off, you can (or at least, dear reader, I did) learn a ton between the tears of laughter.

I have tried previously in the course of my professional life to learn a little economics here and there, but more has stuck with me from this book than from all my prior efforts. I believe you will have the same response, whether you are liberal, conservative, or whatever -- (he really doesn't have that much of a prejudice one way or another in this book, or at least he loses it as the book progresses). Not to be missed.

Make them laugh and they'll listen
This is a book about what makes some countries rich and what condemns others to poverty.PJ O'Rourke spends a couple of years traveling around the globe assessing capitalism and socialism.It could almost be about what made western civilization thrive, what made other countries poor, and what has made socialism a loser over time - which we know becomes a complete loss when you run out of other peoples money or you run out of expensive oil which industrialized companies in the west need.

O'Rourke goes to Wall Street (good capitalism,) Albania (bad Cap'ism,) Sweden (good socialism,) and Cuba (bad socialism,) followed by Tanzinia (how to make nothing from everything,) and to Hong Kong (how to make everything from nothing.He caps it off by going to Shanghai where he writes about "how to have the worst of both worlds." And he's very funny while doing it; probably the funniest writer around.He'll have you in stitches as you actually learn something.I don't know how he comes up with so many brilliant one-liners, but it's uncanny and seemingly never ending.He combines that comedic bent with a facile and knowledgeable mind; he really knows what he's talking about.A course should be adapted to every high school curriculum with nothing, but O'Rourke's books as reading material.Dull students would pay more attention and smart ones would develop greater curiosity while enhancing their collective world views.

It's hard to think of a better way to learn.

Eat The Rich
Reading it again after 11 years, I still find it truly enlightening on the elusive economic matters. Funny as well, as expected, and very insightful and free of the usual ethnocentrism. ... Read more

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Product Description
P. J. O'Rourke's savagely funny and national best-sellerParliament of Whores has become a classic in understanding theworkings of the American political system. Originally written at theend of the Reagan era, this new edition includes an extensive forewordby the renowned political writer Andrew Ferguson -- showing us thatalthough the names and the players have changed, the game is still thesame. Parliament of Whores is an exuberant, broken-field run throughthe ethical foibles, pork-barrel flimflam, and bureaucratic bullrorfleinside the Beltway that leaves no sacred cow unskewered and nopolitically correct sensitivities unscorched.Amazon.com Review
If satirists are at their best when tussling with somethingthey hate, then this is P.J. O'Rourke's masterpiece. He clearly hatesgovernment--and has hated it since before it was cool to do so--andfor all the right reasons, too: it's clumsy, inefficient,hypocritical, greedy, and arrogant. In other words, it magnifies thefaults of the poor saps who staff it. Parliament of Whores isthe humorist's howl of bitter laughter at the entire bloated,numskulled mess. As befits an ex-editor of National Lampoon,nothing is out of bounds for O'Rourke. Speaking of the fabled"football"--that satchel that follows the president around24/7--the author doubts there are really launch codes in there atall--nothing but "a copy of Penthouse and a pint bottle ofHiram Walker--a Penthouse from back in the seventies, whenPenthouse was really dirty, I'll bet."

Parliament ofWhores is perfect for anyone who longs to cultivate anentertaining brand of cynicism, to be "a lone voice--not cryingin the wilderness, thank you, but chortling in the rec room."O'Rourke is a master at making you laugh in spite of the better angelsof your nature, and the only negative thing to be said about this tourde force is that his flamethrower brand of satire leaves nothing inits wake--certainly not the suggestion of an improvement. --MichaelGerber ... Read more

Customer Reviews (63)

Parliament of Whores
I enjoyed the book very much.I've read several of O'Rourke's books and I like his humor, wit and style. He has excellent insights to the world around us. It took a little longer to receive the shipment, but it was a reasonable time.

A parliament is more focused
Personally i thought that this was a funny book. But the major problem that I have with it is that it lacks any storyline and is consisted of political jokes and references, nothing more. If you are looking for a laugh,and were alive in the 80's, definately read this book. Because if you didnt grow up hearing about all the issues and politicians of that era, you will have a hard time understanding what the book is about. But, if you are looking for an engaging read that keeps your interest, I would not suggest this book.

After 18 years it hardly needs updating
Read the other reviews (both contributed and editorial) to see what the book is about.This review is here to tell you how well it stands up almost 20 years after it came out.VERY well.

When you read the section on the S&L bailout, you could apply it to the current financial debacle - just multiply the dollar amounts by 10 or 100.That rule holds through for much of the book.Just multiply by 10 or 100 and it's like reading current events.Solid work.

Among the worst I ever read!
This book has nothing to do with 'Attempts to Explain the Entire U.S. Government'. It's all about a humbug journalist ranting and trying to prove that he's seen it all and knows it all while making very little sense.

While some small sections of the book does make sense, most of it's idiotic, misleading, and filled with conservative rant. PJ is either dumb or lunatic or both! Well, he's a conservative journalist trying to cover subjects much bigger than his background and intellect will ever allow him to understand. It's hard to figure how this guy is much different from Rush the redneck entertainer.

This book is among the worst I ever read. This could be a bit harse given that I read quite selectively. I could go on and on with examples of how bad this book is, but what's the point! Buy it if you're in for a ranting ride with this idiot humbug.

Small world
I have read this book and I am amazed by two things.

It seems that although quite a lot of time has passed since it was first published -- not much changed.

Additionally, being a Pole living in Poland I can compare the "rules" that apply to both the US and Polish authorities and it seems that they do not differ much. So although the author describes specific situation, I am afraid the problem is universal.

Great reading! ... Read more

Product Description
A provocative, conservative satirist shares his strange and twisted days as editor in chief of National Lampoon, his numerous essays on the pleasures and perils of driving, and a look at appropriate sports for middle-aged Republicans. Reprint. 100,000 first printing. $100,000 ad/promo.Amazon.com Review
Readers can be excused for a little motion sickness whenreading this collection of pieces from P.J. O'Rourke. To go frompreaching "Armed Love" (whatever that is) to being anointedas the ultra-libertarian Cato Institute's favorite humorist in only 25years is an astounding transformation.

Still, whether it's New Left juvenilia or high-octane auto journalismscrawled in the Age of Cocaine, one thing holds true: O'Rourke writesone hell of a sentence. Here's P.J.'s impression of Nixon explainingVietnam to a bunch of hippies: "To be really out front, I get offon ego trips, power games. But, like that's where I'm at ... I meanyou can put me down for kicking your ass but don't put me down forbeing an ass-kicker 'cause that's my movie." Then fast-forward 17years: "Sure, everyone says the Sixties were fun. Down at theAmerican Legion hall, everybody says World War II was fun, if you talkto them after 10:00 p.m." Age and Guile is fun, whatevertime it is. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (14)

O'Rourke from Leftist Grub to Conservative Blowfly
This is an excellent anthology of O'Rourke's writings from his commie journalist days in Baltimore in the early 1970s, through his years at NATIONAL LAMPOON, up to the mid-90s when he was writing articles about politics, current events and foreign affairs for ROLLING STONE and the conservative AMERICAN SPECTATOR. Included are articles about cars the he wrote for CAR & DRIVER, articles about fishing and hunting originally published in MEN'S JOURNAL, and a speech he gave at a CATO Institute function.

The essays vary greatly not just with regards to topics, but also with respect to the degree of humour, and some border on the serious. But all are interesting, as any P.J. O'Rourke fan would expect.

As O'Rourke states in the Introduction: "It is, I guess, interesting to watch the leftist grub weaving itself into the pupa of satire and then emerging a resplendent conservative blowfly."

The evolution of a writer
I first got into PJ O'Rourke when I started reading his book "Republican Party Reptile" and realized that I could laugh heartily at his wit, as opposed to the often divisive rhetoric of Rush Limbaugh and Fox News Channel. O'Rourke is equally scathing in his approach to "born-again" nutjobs as he is to "pinko" enviromentalists, and his is a style of writing I wouldn't mind trying to emulate in my own belated (and as yet unpublished) career as a writer.

"Age and Guile" caught my fancy because I had heard it was a collection of his pieces from over the years, and I tried to find it at the local library and various bookstores, but was unlucky in my pursuit. I ended up checking out a Books-on-Tape version of the book, read by Norman Deitz, and I was quite pleased.

The early material is amatuerish, to be fair, but there are nuggets of wit to be found amongst the "juvinelia". The Truth About The Sixties was actually one of my favorite parts of the book, I found it very involving and fascinating to hear. The rest of the book tickled my funny bone. I just don't have enough good things to say about this book.

So, I ordered it on Amazon, and I've recieved it, and it's joined my collection of P.J. O'Rourke books. A liberal at heart myself, I agree with a previous reviewer that O'Rourke celebrates individual freedom and doesn't care for those who try and take it away. I only hope I can be as good at conveying that in my own writing, he's certainly one hell of a teacher.

Politics, stories, and concrete poetry -- best of everything
PJ O'Rourke has always been one of my favorite cultural and political commentators.An unrepentant Libertarian Republican who used to be an unrepentant Marxist radical, O'Rourke is a conservative who writes with all the wit and verve that, supposedly, only liberals are capable of.P.J. O'Rourke is the Al Franken of the American Right, if Al Franken were actually funny.Age and Guile Beat Youth, Innocence, and a Bad Haircut is made up of O'Rourke's previously uncollected writings over the past three decades.As such, the book begins with a few choice pieces from his angry days as a Marxist journalist in the early '70s (where, it must be said, O'Rourke still writes with a wit that proves that funny is funny not matter what the ideology) moves on to cover his brief period as an adherent to Concrete Poetry (an art form that he admits still having no idea what to make of) and finally closes with a few of his recent essays as Rolling Stone's Foreign Affairs Editor.Best of all, O'Rourke includes a few short stories that he wrote and published while editor of National Lampoon.The stories, all dealing with his past as a '60s radical, are a perfect mixture of radical nostalgia and modern day clear headedness and, along with an unexpected pathos for his lost characters wandering through the political wilderness of protest, they also rank amongst the most hilarious of O'Rourke's writings, perfectly displaying his trademark style of detached irony and self-depreciating wit (one can always sense O'Rourke saying, "Can you believe they actually pay me to write this stuff?").Perhaps most nicely, the pieces in this collection are arranged by chronological order so that the reader literally goes through O'Rourke's political and literary evolution with him over the course of the book.As such, we're provided with a nice view of the political odyssey of both O'Rourke and America over the past 30-odd years.If one thing remains the same it is that O'Rourke, whether conservative or liberal, consistently refuses to accept anything at face value.He remains, always, the eternal skeptic.And we, as readers, are all the better off for it.

Face it, the guy's funny
First and foremost: it is worth noting (and it pains an saddens me that this is the case) that the phrase "Youth, Innocence, and a Bad Haircut" is the first time I have seen a three-item list with correctgrammar in a book printed in America after World War II.

Second, andnot quite so foremost: P. J. O'Rourke is a very, very funny guy. He iscompletely politically incorrect, in most cases, and is therefore more thanhappy to pull out the jokes, puns, and other humorous concepts his moreliberal colleagues have left to the dust.

Third, and not really farup there on the scale, but still worth mentioning: in most ways, P. J.O'Rourke is a tremendous boon to the right-wing American. He's not afraidto take pot-shots at just about anything, including fellow members of theright (Pat Buchanan is roasted almost as often as Bill Clinton), and he'snot afraid to admit his mistakes, such as endorsing Clinton in 1992.

Combine those, and for most of this book you have a tremendously funnyread, an almost literary roasting of such things as book tours, drinking,stupid sports, Whitewater, various makes and models of automobile, and thelike. Unfortunately, it's the part that falls outside the realm of"most" that keeps this from being one of the finest politicalcollections of the past decade. There are times when O'Rourke, who seems tobe sitting right on the Libertarian partyline, veers far off to the left,and if he is to be trusted he was stuck out there in at least one case bythe head of the Cato Institute (making me wonder how Libertarian they trulyare), and he also has many of the strange and illogical hang-ups that keepme from ever wanting to vote Republican. He also, and he is well aware ofit, asks a lot of our indulgence in the book's second section, a collectionof short stories published (well, most of them) in the National Lampoonduring his tenure as editor in chief there. Anyone who still wonders why Iabhor the very idea of self-publishing need only read the section "TheTruth About the Sixties and Other Fictions" in this book. It'sshameless, awful, contorted, constipated prose, and O'Rourke is fully awareof this, and even says so in a few places.

But if you skip thatsection, and immediately stop reading any time you find one of those placeswhere conservatives suddenly dismiss anything relating to logic (I haveoften theorized it's remnants of too many drugs during the sixties), thisis most definitely a worthwhile book. Both the automobile and sportssections brought forth guffaws. And if you've ever heard me guffaw, you'llknow that's soemthing to stay away from.

Hillarious!
If you or someone you know and love is looking for great material for a speach competition, try the stories "Dynamite" and "Another Tale of Uncle Mike."I used them to get to the state competition. The book is all-around hillarious with great little tips such as how toout-drink an Irish wedding party when they have a few hours head-start.Italso has some great lines such as "none of us were seriously hurt,except for Terry, who had part of a hash pipe blown up his nose, somethingthey had a hard time understanding at the emergency room."Buy it andlaugh. ... Read more

Product Description
A rule book for living in a world without rules, Modern Manners is an irreverent guide to anti-etiquette for the '90s and beyond. Pointed advice covers a range of topics from sex to death to reading habits. Also included are the most up-to-date forms of vulgarity and churlishness, as well as the latest fashion in discourtesy and barbarous display.Amazon.com Review
As one of the few folks who made it out of the National Lampoon aliveand writing, P. J. O'Rourke is--a comment that might please him more than mosthumorists--an elder statesman of American humor. While this says muchabout the thinness of the field, you gotta give him his props.

Modern Manners is good, early O'Rourke, a book that you can read andenjoy without being to the right of Francisco Franco. Who can resist linessuch as "A hat should be taken off when you greet a lady and left off for therest of your life. Nothing looks more stupid than a hat." Or, "Don't wear atweed jacket to work unless you expect to flush a covey of quail from behindthe Xerox machine." Manners are amoving target, and some sections are in need of revision (cocaine really wasa big deal, wasn't it?), but don't let that dissuade you. By and large,Modern Manners comes through admirably. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (9)

Darkly silly book
I read this book a couple decades ago, then ordered it via Amazon as a present for a friend.Those of you expecting O'Rourke to do political analysis in this book are looking for the wrong sort of thing.This is more in keeping with his writings for National Lampoon back when he was managing editor.I still like his hat advice: "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."

funny for people with an iq of 90.
i thought id enjoy a book from o rourke. i find his interviews rather cool. it turns out the humor got predictable and boring real fast. it reads like a dorky teen humor magazine

Pretty Funny Satire
This book is a good satire of our society and its mores.Written nearly 30 years ago, it still applies to American culture today.Unlike most of his political works where he blends semi-funny jokes with right-wing ideology, in this book P.J. O'Rourke generally leaves politics alone to focus on ridiculing every aspect of modern American culture: from the drugs we take, to our sexual morals, to the insipid youth culture, and on and on.His main point, from what I can tell, is that in modern America, we've all become self-absorbed bastards.He may be on to something.

Biting, Laugh Out Loud Read
If you enjoy the intelligent and biting humor of a Dennis Miller and the vocabulary of a George Will you will love this book.If your idea of a great satirical read is "Mad Magazine" you will enjoy this book.If you think the Als - Gore and Franken - are brilliant you will hate this book.

Perverted disgusting garbage
Reading Mr. O'Rourke's "All the Troubles in the World" gave me the impression that he is an excellent political/economics analyst with a tolerable bad streak. The fine writing in that book encouraged me to acquire some of his other work.

I was horribly repulsed by the explicit language, immature humor and overall repugnance of his guide to manners. What I had hoped would be a light poke at contemporary society so sickened me that I threw the book in the trash before I was halfway done. I regret reading even that far. ... Read more

Product Description
With his latest national best seller, Peace Kills, P.J. O'Rourke casts his ever-shrewd and mordant eye on America's latest adventures in warfare. Imperialism has never been more fun.To unravel the mysteries of war, O'Rourke first visits Kosovo: "Wherever there's injustice, oppression, and suffering, America will show up six months later and bomb the country next to where it's happening." He travels to Israel at the outbreak of the intifada. He flies to Egypt in the wake of the 9 - 11 terrorists' attacks and contemplates bygone lunacies. "Why are the people in the Middle East so crazy? Here, at the pyramids, was an answer from the earliest days of civilization: People have always been crazy." He covers the demonstrations and the denunciations of war. "A moral compass needle needs a butt end. Wherever direction France is pointing-toward collaboration with Nazis, accommodation with communists, existentialism, Jerry Lewis, or a UN resolution veto-we can go the other way with a quiet conscience." Finally he arrives in Baghdad with the U.S. Army and, standing in one of Saddam's palaces, decides, "If a reason for invading Iraq was needed, felony interior decorating would have sufficed." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (47)

Dull and underwhelming.
P.J. is supposed to be funny, right-wing and independent writer. I guess of all those epithets he deserves only right-winged...

The book is trying to be offensive to liberals, but isn't really good even at that. On the flip side, it might work for right-wing borg: after all they gobble up Fox news channel dung and always ready for more.

My first foray into P.J. O'Rourke's books (a review of the audiobook)
5 discs
5 hours
Read by Dick Hill

I've read some of P.J. O'Rourke's columns and have heard an interview or two so I knew that I would most likely find one of his books to be most interesting.

To begin with, I found it mostly dead-on accurate and depressing. Observations about the War in Bosnia, human nature in general and Israel were factually interesting but mostly deflating. Not that I am overly optimistic about human nature (being both a history major and a Lutheran has given me a fairly low opinion about the character of humanity) but P.J.'s account was even getting to me.

But, in the middle it picks up - ironically with his description of 9/11 and the days that followed in Washington, D.C. I found his observations to be keen, interesting and, in an odd way, hopeful. His descriptions of the pro-Palestinian/anti-war protests was a hoot. Laugh out loud funny.

His commentary on the Nobel Prize winners open letter about the state of the world issued in mid-2001 was so good that I almost felt sorry that 100 of the smartest people on the planet were up against O'Rourke. He makes mincemeat of their poorly written logic-defying declaration and along the way had me rolling.

O'Rourke traveled to Iraq during invasion in 2003. Wonderfully observant (his comments on the looters are interesting and make me wonder if they were masterminded in some way) and sometimes laugh out loud funny, especially the scene with the case of beer.

He bookends the book with another very dark, depressing chapter with a visit to Iwo Jima. It was a good and fitting ending, but not at all humorous. But, let's face it, war is tragic, not funny and O'Rourke's good even when he's not being funny.

Expertly read by Dick Hill who is one of the best audiobook narrators in the business.

P.J. isn't for everyone.
He goes out of his way to take radically un-PC, illiberal viewpoints that will truly offend many people, and present them as absolutely his own with no reservations or apologies. Thus the title of this book, for example.

The thing is, even when I disagree with him (or at least his stated opinion, possibly presented merely as a thought excercise to present a new and different perspective on a subject generally treated only in banalities) (which is frequently) I have to admit that he makes many good points, in an acerbically witty way that can elicit a chuckle even from subjects that JUST AREN'T FUNNY.

If you are of the liberal persuasion, and can't stand reading somebody who disagrees with you, and worse, who doesn't take your positions seriously, who has a smart mouth and is quick to mock anything and everything that he finds foolish (including, to be fair, those on his own side of the political spectrum, when he feels they have it coming) you will not enjoy this book, or any other of P.J. O'Rourke's books. But if you tend to the conservative side of the spectrum, and can tolerate a bit of irreverence toward your own sacred cows from somebody who seems to be more or less on your own side, or if you can tolerate even snide disagreement from someone who writes well, is witty, and has some very interesting insights from some very odd perspectives (and perhaps best of all, who doesn't take himself any more seriously than he takes anyone or anything else) you may like this book, even if you find many of his apparent opinions appalling. If you've read other of his books, and liked them, you'll doubtless like this one. If you've read one or two of his other works, and not enjoyed them, it may mean that you wouldn't care for this one, or it may mean that your previous experiences are not his best work; "Enemies List" is appallingly not funny, "Modern Manners" is pretty useless, "Age & Guile Beat Youth, Innocence, & A Bad Haircut" was basically a self-indulgent bit of fluff written for no better reason than to get a paycheck. But if you've read "Parliament of Whores", "Give War A Chance", and/or "All The Trouble in the World", and not liked them, you definitely will not care for this one, either.

Meandering travel diary?
A friend of the family gave us "Peace Kills".I was excited to read it, because I had heard good things about PJ.

I found the book very disorganized, unless it was supposed to be a travel diary.As a travel diary, the books is fine, as he writes about what he saw and heard and experienced during his travels.I did not find that he had any insights or profound observations, nor did he have any particular point of view.

Unfortunately, I would have to say that it was kind of like attending the lecture of an incompetent and older college professor who talks on and on without ever getting to the point.I still have no idea what the point is of the title.It is a compelling title, but there's nothing in the book that supports the title.

Reading this book was kind of like watching some dumb sitcom on television;it passes the time, you are mildly distracted, but a few days later, you cannot remember a thing about it.

"Irreverent" Says the Jacket. How About: Irrelevant?
I guess you have to be a solid fan of P.J.'s to appreciate this all-over-the-farm, what's-he-talking-about effort. Too many times more than once I had to closely re-read several lines to figure out what he's trying to say.

For instance....

"Perhaps disaffected experimental colossus carvers, young barley-beer addicts, and aspiring scribes with papyrus sheets full of edgy new hieroglyphics had crash pads in the Great Pyramid of Khufu." -so he says. [Page 92] Huh? This kind of rambling clarity goes on page after page after page.... O'Rourke is obviously one writer who says things in 30 words where others can get the idea out in 10. I guess, though, this must be his attraction [Check-out all the 4- and 5-star reviews!] ...as he mixes up thoughts and topics in paragraph blends that oftentimes seem confusing, endless, awkward, haphazard, and occasionally meaningless.

Hey, P.J. If you have something important you wanna' tell us, why put it in code?! "Why Americans Hate Foreign policy"? OK. Why!?? --I Still don't know from this chapter.

O'Rourke's in Egypt. He's in Kosovo. He offers his slant on 9/11, Kuwait, Iraq and the Nobel Prize. He's genuinely all over the place with his "absurdist" wit ...and there's little tie-in to any of it. -Why, there's (supposedly clever) rambling irrelevance on every page!"Peace Kills"? I'm still not sure what the title has to do with what I just read. --More like "Peace Kills" kills the spirit of clarity and meaning in writing and reading.

For those that enjoyed this book, I respect your patience, insight and appreciation for the random word. For those that require something more straightforward, try Mark Steyn.
... Read more

Product Description
Now available from Grove Press, P. J. O'Rourke's classic, best-selling guided tour of the world's most desolate, dangerous, and desperate places. "Tired of making bad jokes" and believing that "the world outside seemed a much worse joke than anything I could conjure," P. J. O'Rourke traversed the globe on a fun-finding mission, investigating the way of life in the most desperate places on the planet, including Warsaw, Managua, and Belfast. The result is Holidays in Hell--a full-tilt, no-holds-barred romp through politics, culture, and ideology. P.J.'s adventures include storming student protesters' barricades with riot police in South Korea, interviewing Communist insurrectionists in the Philippines, and going undercover dressed in Arab garb in the Gaza Strip. He also takes a look at America's homegrown horrors as he braves the media frenzy surrounding the Reagan-Gorbachev summit in Washington D.C., uncovers the mortifying banality behind the white-bread kitsch of Jerry Falwell's Heritage USA, and survives the stultifying boredom of Harvard's 350th anniversary celebration. Packed with P.J.'s classic riffs on everything from Polish nightlife under communism to Third World driving tips, Holidays in Hell is one of the best-loved books by one of today's most celebrated humoristsAmazon.com Review
No doubt about it: P. J. O'Rourke has a bizarre sense of fun. "What I've ... been," he writes in his introduction to Holidays in Hell "is a Trouble Tourist--going to see insurrections, stupidities, political crises, civil disturbances and other human folly because ... because it's fun." Forget Hawaii or the Poconos--O'Rourke gets his jollies in places like war-tornLebanon where he is greeted at the border by a gun barrel in his face, or Seoul, just in time for election-day violence. Wherever he goes, however, O'Rourke takes his quirky sense of humor, laser eye for detail, and artful way with words: a Philippine army officer is "powerful-looking in a short, compressed way, like an attack hamster," and the Syrian army is described as having "dozens of silly hats, mostly berets in yellow, orange and shockingpink, but also tiny pillbox chapeaux.... The paratroopers wear shiny goldjumpsuits and crack commando units have skin-tight fatigues in a camouflage pattern of violet, peach, flesh tone and vermilion on a background of vivid purple. This must give excellent protective coloration in, say, a room full of Palm Beach divorcees in Lily Pulitzer dresses."

O'Rourke's flip, sarcastic style isn't for everyone, of course; the concept that anyone could find sightseeing in the Beirut or El Salvador of the 1980s fun might prove offensive to more than a few readers right off the bat. But love him or hate him, P. J. O'Rourke knows how to tell a good story, and if you like your travel writing laced with more than a little cynicism, Holidays in Hell could be just the book you've been looking for. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (34)

Top of My List Even Until Now
Im a pretty traveled person, and I see PJ's glimpses every now and then. It makes a great present for my mates. I read it over again when I feel I need a good laugh. I love the part about the French.

Wonderful bitter truth
This book is a very healthy product of a healthy type of thinking.It is a good sign that this country is "in good shape" as long as it can produce intelligent opposition to some weird or unhealthy world and domestic events (for example, "The Simpsons" and "South Park" as well as "Politically Incorrect Guide to..." book series). It is a good sigh of the "society health" when there are native writers like O'Rourke, who can give an objective view (presented wittily and with humor slightly ironical and often with subtle sarcasm) on some present or recently powerful political movements, events and tendencies. I myself from the former Soviet Union, and the article about socialist Poland was probably the most interesting from the point of view that it was almost the same what I saw in Russia. It is not so important how pathetic the picture of everyday life was seenby the American , but the final conclusion a reader should come to (and O'Rourke makes it obvious) - how sick the idea of an artificial social structure based on an approach is, "to take everything away form the haves and then share with everybody" (it is what Russian writer Mikhail Bulgakov's character Sharikov said in his "Heart of a Dog").

Almost without exceptions the stories in the book cut trough propaganda and bare the truth behind the facades. The "Among the Euro-Weenies", although written some time ago is more and more relevant today.

Moreover, O'Rourke dialogues are short, immensely interesting and compressed, giving points difficult not to accept.

Humorous, sarcastic and profound at the same time.
If you aren't familiar with PJ O'Rourke, the caustic, polically-incorrect humorist who used to write for the Rolling Stone when it was worth reading, this book of collected travel writings from the 1980's is a good place to start.Besides being funny, O'Rourke has an irritating way of insulting your favorite politician or political movement by pointing out their idiocy and forcing you to realize you are an idiot too for believing them.And you still enjoy the article.

O'Rourke is fairly conservative, in a libertarian sort of way, so if you think Gore is exciting, Hillary (or Bill for that matter) is sexy, and Obama is a black descendant of slaves who fought his way to the top via expensive prep schools, Columbia and Harvard, you probably won't enjoy this book.O'Rourke savages Republicans too, but he seems to enjoy skewering liberals more.

That said, this book is a collection of mostly foreign travels (with some American sites thrown in) to various dysfunctional areas of the world.If you have ever spent time in some of these places, he grasps their essence much better than a serious, straight-up political writer.Probably because he realizes that most politicians and official press agencies are steaming piles of horse-apples.

There are chapters on Lebanon, Russia, Nicaragua, Poland, Korea, El Salvador, Disney World, South Africa, Harvard, the Phillipines, and Panama.Most of these chapters were written at the time of some idealogical war.How can you not laugh at things like the Sandinista Director of Censorship denying there is any censorship by saying, "They [Newspaper La Prensa] accused us of suppressing freedom of expression. This was a lie and we could not let them publish it."

On a somber note, you will note that the same Sandinistas are back in power in Nicaragua, Europeans are still weenies ("Among the Euro-weenies" is still spot on), and all the bureacratic and political shenanigans and ironies are identical to what I suffered last time I tried to get on an airplane.(I never did make it since my 6 year old was on the "no-fly" list.Damn, how did they know he was such a spoiled brat?)

So read this and laugh, and then you can cry later when it all hits home.

In History
Great book about travel in the 80's. Gives you a real feeling of how these places might have been back then, and my favorite was Lebanon. I imagine some war torn areas are like that now. The first few pages were amusing, but then they became serious as hell, though O'Rourke probably tried to be funny.

Irreverent, funny, and dated
Written in the 1980's, the 3rd world political references are a bit dated but his experiences in these countries and witty, irreverent observations are still relevant and entertaining.A good, light read with some quotable quotes. ... Read more

Product Description
"Driving Like Crazy" chronicles P. J. O'Rourke's thirty-year-long love affair with cars - combining his classic pieces with new, previously unpublished work, it is an inimitably humorous and pleasurable celebration of cars, speed, and the open road. P. J. O'Rourke, 'the funniest writer in America', harbors a guilty pleasure - ever since growing up the son of a car dealer in Ohio, he has been crazy about cars. In "Driving Like Crazy", he revels in his love for all things vehicular. From a thousand-mile expedition across Mexico, to a trek through Kyrgyzstan in the back of a Soviet army surplus truck; from an alcohol-fuelled weekend in North Carolina, to an eventful journey from Islamabad to Calcutta; and, from Buicks to Land Rovers to Harley-Davidson's, P. J O'Rourke gets behind the wheel to take us on a hell-bending tour of some of the worlds most scenic - and most treacherous - roads. Along the way he muses on everything from the peculiar joys of NASCAR, to what type of car handles best, to the mind-boggling misdemeanors it is possible to perform in the front (and back) seat.Spanning over thirty years, and combining O'Rourke's classic journalism with original, previously unpublished pieces, this is P. J. at his Gonzo best: a must-read for his many fans, and for anyone who shares his hopelessly passionate devotion to the car. Fasten your seatbelts; you're in for a bumpy ride. ... Read more

Product Description
New York Times best-selling author P. J. O'Rourke lobbed one-liners on the battlefields of the Gulf War, traded quips with communist rebels in the jungles of the Philippines, and went undercover at the Dome of the Rock Mosque as P.J. of Arabia. Now, in his most challenging adventure, he journeys to the heart of that truly harrowing place -- his living room. The CEO of the Sofa follows America's preeminent political humorist through a year on the domestic front as he covers stories (and visits watering holes) close to home. He waxes cynical over the election of Hillary Clinton. He waxes nostalgic over learning to drive. He waxes poetic as he adds happy endings for liberals to famous tragedies. Now if he would just wax the kitchen floor. And P.J. does still get off the couch and embark on exotic adventures -- to the magical land of India, to the U.N. Millennial Summit, to a blind (drunk) wine tasting with Christopher Buckley, and, most exotical of all, to a Motel 6 where he has twenty-eight channels and a bathroom to himself. In The CEO of the Sofa, P.J. tackles everything and the kitchen sink, fighting evil, injustice, and absurdity with the gloves off and the oven mitts on. "An entertaining and engaging read." -- Dick Lispey, Associated Press "O'Rourke swings cheerfully into action ... nothing has softened [his] wicked sense of fun." -- Allen D. Boyer, The New York Times Book Review "His fans will love it. Democrats will grit their teeth and laugh to ease the pain." -- Chicago Sun-Times ... Read more

Customer Reviews (40)

Over done reading
The audio version of this book is way over the top. When the reader reads dry humor in such a flowery way he makes the author sound snotty. I couldn't bear it. Its hard to say if I would have liked it better if the reader had toned it down.

"Your girlfriend's ugly,your wife's a bitch,and your dog can't hunt."
I love political satire and humor,both left and right wing.I can't believe it;but this is the first book of PD's that I've read.I know he is a popular writer,his books are everywhere;but for some reason I've passed them up.I guess I just wrote them off as popular fiction.I've got nobody to blame but myself ,but now that I've found him,I'll be reading more.
A lot of writers of political satire confuse hatred, foul language and outright nastiness with humor.Not so with PD.He takes the ordinary things that go on all the time and comes up with off-the- wall thinking and makes very different and truly humorous comments and observations.His approach is reminiscent of Twainand more recently Mark Russell.He had my sides splitting without resorting to mean spirited character assissination.His humor is more like the type of thing you get on "Roasts".
He amazed me time and tme again,by pointing out great humor where I had not even realized it existed.
If you like one-liners the book is littered with them.
Here is a little bit of the sort of thing he gives us:
"NABAA--The National Association to Ban Almost Everything"
"Clinton's popularity ratings are getting so high he's starting
to date again."
"If I had a cell phone, I'd lose it.I lose everything,I left my
first wife in the back of a cab somewhere."
"The only thing the UN is suited for,according to its charter,
is an invasion from Mars."
"The Web is just a device by which bad ideas travel around the
world at the speed of light."
"NAPWETD--National Association of People ith Not Enough to Do."
"Ideas are to Hillary,what sex is to her husband."
"Since the time of Jimmy Carter,Liberals have been chasing
their tail,and,last heard,they've caught it and begun eating
and had chewed their way up to the back of their own ears."
"The computer becomes the handgun of modern mugging."
"This spawned a multitudinous generation of white-collar
criminals who can't even be bothered with the collar."
"Kids today may be wizards with virtual reality,yet they seem
a little foggy about what makes reality virtuous.

He does some great takes on a book "Guidelines for Bias-FreeWriting",obviously from the left:
"Sure,the task force seems to be nothing but a rat bag of
shoddy pedagogues,athletes of the tongue,professional pick-
nits filling the stupid hours of their pointless days with
nagging the yellow-bellied editors of university presses,
which print volume after volume of bound-wad fated to sit
unread in college library stacks until the sun expires.
"Why doesn't the task force just combine "she" and "it" and
pronounce the thing accordingly."
If you've ever read Hunter S. Thompson's "Fear and Loathing in
Las Vegas", or seen the movie,and wondered what it was all
about;PJ explains it allfor you.
"A thrilling saga in which nothing much happens--a fitting
example of the picaresque for the Now Generation.One of the
things Hunter did in this book was write a coda to,an obituary
for,the nonsense of the 1960's.It is important to recall that
in the 1960's nothing much happened."
So,you can see,nothing in off-limits to PJ'sharp satire.
He keeps CEO's,the Stock Markets,technology,Drugs,Gun Control,
Political Correctness,Europe,India and particularly,the Liberal
Elite directly in his gun sites and fires back with some of
the best ammunition available---HUMOR!
This book has made me a P.D. James fan.
Oh yeah,my title is a quote from page 103;guess who he was
talking about.

Hit and miss.
If, like me, you read P.J. and enjoy his wit even though you frequently find yourself disagreeing with him politically, there is a great deal of material in this book that you will find very funny. However, if like me, you occasionally find that he goes too far and simply becomes insulting without bothering to be witty, you will find a great deal in this book annoying and unfunny. In this, it is not unlike "Republican Party Reptile", although it's not quite as funny and a bit more irritating. In quality, it's about on a par with "Bachelor Home Companion", although that book was less political and thus less annoying when it failed to be funny. As such, it's nowhere near as good as his best work: "Parliament of Whores", "Eat The Rich", "Holidays In Hell", and "Give War A Chance", in (more or less) order from best down, but it's miles ahead of his worst books, "The Enemies List", "Modern Manners", and "Age And Guile...", in order from worst up.

If you actually enjoy P.J. unconditionally and agree with his politics more than I do, you may well find this book more enjoyable than I did. I'd still say that it's a mid-range effort when compared to his other works.

Not his best, perhaps, but still worth reading.
I agree with some of the negative comments of others who comment on the book, that it's not his best, but there are still enough observations and turns of phrase that make you laugh out loud, to make it worth reading. I'm on the last 60 pages, now.

O'Rourke Is Masterful
Being an avid reader of O'Rourke's material, I must say this book is one-of-a-kind.It is written in the style of Oliver Wendell Holmes' "The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table" which was a brilliant collection of essays and observations of life.As O'Rourke notes, "Holmes pulled this off with so much wit and charm that there was only one way I could pay his idea the compliment it deserved.I swiped it."

P.J.'s own collection of essays features Holmes-like alter-egos ("The Political Nut" browbeating the Democrat neighbors and frustrating O'Rourke's wife makes for some of the best one-liners in the book) and collections of O'Rourke's own superbly-written essays.From travels through India (beware the customs officials) to the U.N. Millenium Summit ("At the UN they put butter on their bagels.No wonder these people can't achieve peace in the Middle East."), O'Rourke's own wit and charm somehow makes sense of senseless situations.But please, don't believe that this book is only for the ivory-tower intellectual clique -- essays are included which feature everything from a Drunken Wine Tasting Test to helpful automotive tips.("Use a lighter weight oil in the winter.Johnson's Baby Oil, for instance.Rub this all over somebody cute, stay home, and forget about starting the car.")

The book's politics will primarily delight Republicans and irritate Democrats, although anyone who can laugh at political absurdity will find this a great read no matter what their personal political leanings.O'Rourke dissects (and flambes) Hillary Clinton's book "It Takes a Village," he offers his own arbitration of the 2000 Presidential debacle, the topic of Social Security privatization is discussed (an unintentionally relevant topic four years later), and the last chapter of the book is rife with all the sardonic partisanship one would ever need to convulse on the floor with laughter.

In short, this book covers a year's worth of topics, and before you realize it you've read the whole book in one sitting.Quite fitting, from someone who describes the theme of his book as being "One year in the life of a man who said, 'Mind if I put my feet up?I think I will take this lying down.'" ... Read more

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Customer Reviews (50)

Could have been so much more.
As an economics teacher, Adam Smith's "An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations" has long been on my "to read" list. I downloaded a free copy of it to my Kindle e-reader, but I haven't seriously considered opening it. I've read summaries of his ideas, perused his quotes and espoused his ideas in class, but I have not had the gumption to read 600 pages of 18th century prose.

When I discovered P.J. O'Rourke had written a commentary on the book I was thrilled. I do enjoy most of what O'Rourke writes and I figured his funny, insightful sarcastic take on things should do quite a bit to punch up a nearly 225 year-old economics text.

Let's start with the basics. Adam Smith (1723-1790) was a professor of both Moral Philosophy and Logic at the University of Glasgow in Scotland. He wrote two books, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (Penguin Classics) (1759) and The Wealth of Nations(1776), usually abbreviated The Wealth of Nations, often considered to be one of the first books on modern economics. Smith argued that freedom, both political and economic, was the ultimate source of happiness because the "invisible hand" of the free market would regulate the market and provide the best living for the most amount of people as possible. It is an interesting coincidence that the American Revolution and The Wealth of Nations both debuted in 1776.

I picked up P.J. O'Rourke's commentary on Smith's two books (the title and the cover do not tell the reader, but O'Rourke actually makes commentary on both books - he makes the compelling argument that they are really inter-related) and was expecting big things out of a very small book (242 pages including index, bibliography, endnotes and several pages of selected quotations).

Unfortunately, I did not get very big things. O'Rourke's pizzaz and razmataz, his quick wit and his inclination to make a smart comment about everything - traits that can be very endearing and that I enjoyed very much in his book Peace Kills: America's Fun New Imperialismgot in the way big time. For example when discussing Smith's arguments about the value of importing goods and how free trade is a good thing. This is a controversial topic even now, more than 200 years later and O'Rourke adds nothing to it - in fact he hurts the argument by noting: "...imports are Christmas morning; exports are January's MasterCard bill." (p. 24)

If O'Rourke would have toned down the comments (Note: not eliminate, just tone down), this book would have been much more useful. As it was, I sometimes felt like I was reading Dave Barry's Dave Barry Slept Here: A Sort of History of the United States. The attempt to leaven the dry nature of Smith's original work with jokes failed - I just had to work too hard to seperate the facts from the jokes.

Did I learn enough about Smith and his thoughts to avoid that feeling of failure I get when I see "The Wealth of Nations" on my Kindle? Probably, so the book was not a complete failure. However, I feel like the book was a missed opportunity. The right man was picked to write this book, but he was allowed to play around a little too much.

book for my son
I ordered this for my son.It was like new, as advertised, and arrived in a reasonable amount of time.i would order from this seller again.

This has little to do with The Wealth of Nations
Well-known libertarian humorist P.J. O'Rourke has ostensibly taken it upon himself to summarize Adam Smith's seminal work "On the Wealth of Nations" in this book.Unfortunately, all that comes through is P.J. O'Rourke's shallow view of economics, coupled to his forced attempts to link an 18th century economist to whatever the punchline of the day is.Adam Smith's work is full of nuance and caveats about market economics that, unfortunately, undermine O'Rourke's simplistic libertarian philosophy.So, rather than confront these nuances, O'Rourke mentions that unnamed nuances exist and then tells a joke about his personal boogeymen, be it Bill Moyers or fabled-yet-unnamed liberals who think economics is a zero-sum game.Adam Smith's works are vastly enlightening (although dense reading); O'Rourke can be funny if given free reign; the pairing of the two dulls the brilliance of Smith's work and the sharpness of O'Rourke's wit at the same time, leaving a book that is too misleadingly simplistic to be enlightening and too ham-handed to be funny.If you're looking for libertarian comedy, look at some of O'Rourke's other works.If you're looking for a useful and educational commentary on Adam Smith's work, look elsewhere.If, for some reason, you want a book that does neither well, but does so simultaneously, then I guess you could read this book.It won't hurt you so long as you don't take it seriously.

Snark and wit do not enhance a classic
I am NOT one of those familiar with O'Rourke's earlier works, neither a fan nor a critic. But I thought I might learn a bit more about Adam Smith. Well there is some facts and historical perspective in this book but the collage of the serious with attempts at stand up comedy and talk radio zingers muddle the whole effort.For humor it is not worth the time. For information it is too fuddled to be worth the effort.

Witty and Concise, A New Look At Adam Smith
Years ago, when I was in college, I had to trudge my way through "On the Wealth of Nations" and I can remember it was like trying to swim upstream in a muddy river.When I found out that P. J. O'Rourke wrote a book on the tome, I admit I was curious.This did not seem in character for the wit whose books I have grown to love.I purchased it anyway and I am so glad.The author actually brought out the best of the economic philosophy and opened my eyes to a different Adam Smith.This is the way Adam Smith should be studied.

Bravo Mr. O'Rourke, you have indeed impressed me. Well done! ... Read more

Product Description
The author of Parliament of Whores offers a satirical and insightful view of the world's worries, comparing over-population in Bangladesh and in California, multiculturalism in higher education and in Yugoslavia, and other issues. 150,000 first printing. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (38)

Saving the Whails
P.J. O'Rourke is like that wise and reliable army or college buddy, who when you're drunk enough to embrace stupid, nudges you in the ribs to remind you that yes, the woman you're grinning at does indeed have a nice smile, but her lipstick is smeared, her eye make-up shouldn't be greener than a 65 Dodge Dart, and besides being a little overweight the Adam's apple she has suggest that all's not what it appears.
ALL THE TROUBLES IN THE WORLD should be mandatory reading in high school and college, if only to balance out the bull droppings of teachers and professors who speak eloquently and passionately on the ills of the world but haven't bothered to actually to spend much time traveling in it. Boots on the ground always offer up better views than brochures.
O'Rourke is smart, funny, and spot on with his observations. He would make a fine assistant Ambassador to the UN, if say, they allowed scotch and cigars at the table and he was able to nudge the Ambassador to remind him that that sweet little nation over there with the come hither eyes actually has an Adam's apple.
Or, to be properly PC ...then to nudge the female Amabassador to remind her that the hunk of a habitat she's thinking about going to bed with won't actually call her in the morning and might have stolen her credit card.
Put down that vampire romance novel and give a read to this book because it might open your eyes to the fact that things don't really suck.

As always...
PJ delivers as always, this is very funny at times (for a re-born republican that is... lol)

Funny as hell
Some disclosure - I'm a huge PJ O'Rourke Fan. Even so, this book, along with "Eat the Rich" is a classic.

Everytime you hear how messed up the US is, or how bad things are, or any other Chicken Little squawking pick this up. I've read it at least three times and it still cracks me up. It's a great perspective and makes you feel lucky if you live in the US. His books give me some of my best one-liners.

Humor and logic... two great tastes that taste great together.
Even those who disagree with P.J. O'Rourke's conclusions will usually tell you that his manner of expressing those conclusions is highly entertaining.O'Rourke's dry wit and bizarely appropriate analogies are absolutely hysterical.I listened to this book at the gym and had several of those "weird guy laughing at nothing" moments that can make you an outcast in a hurry.

But besides being funny, O'Rourke applies sound fundamentals of economics and history to a very logical dissection of the world around us.Being written in 1993, some of this book's examples are dated, but the logic used to analyze them is just as instructive today as it was then, and most of today's issues possess close parrallels in O'Rourke's 90s examples.

The book reads lightly, but O'Rourke traveled to Somalia, Haiti, the Amazon, Vietnam and other hot spots in writing this book - he did serious work and has a serious philosophy underlying his humor.

Give this one a read and see the world the way the politicians would rather we didn't.

Laugh and Learn
P.J. O'Rourke is the thinking man's John Stewart.Where Stewart is merely snarky and cutesy, O'Rourke has some actual working knowledge of the world, of history, and of human nature.In this book, he adroitly and hilariously skewers all of the "Henny Penny" sky-is-falling enviro-nazis who's holier-than-thou worship of nature is about to snuff out the human race.If you wonder why ideas like the Kyoto Protocol are so insane and ill-advised, read this book.If you've ever wondered about terrorist groups such as E.L.F., read this book.If you've ever had an unexplainable urge to snicker and hoot with derision whenever some earnest WASPy wannabe rasta mon tie-dyed tree-hugger begins to blather on about alar, read this book.In the midst of all of his cynicism and sarcasm, P.J. actually sheds a lot of light on some of the motivations, emotionalism, and deceptions of the far leftist enviro-whacko movement...how it is based in inaccuracy and ideological lunacy.He presents solid, well-researched facts in a way that is not dry, but delightfully pointed.This book is the archenemy of Al Gore's sci-fi thriller, EARTH IN THE BALANCE, and it blows the ex-Veep's book all to hell, and will leave the reader in tears of laughter.Check it out! ... Read more

Product Description
An anthology of twenty-five years of writing, collected for the first time, by the nation's best-selling satirist--author of Parliament of Whores--shows his transition from hippie to neo-conservative. 150,000 first printing. $150,000 ad/promo. Tour. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

O'Rourke from Leftist Grub to Conservative Blowfly
This is an excellent anthology of O'Rourke's writings from his commie journalist days in Baltimore in the early 1970s, through his years at NATIONAL LAMPOON, up to the mid-90s when he was writing articles about politics, current events and foreign affairs for ROLLING STONE and the conservative AMERICAN SPECTATOR.Included are articles about cars the he wrote for CAR & DRIVER, articles about fishing and hunting originally published in MEN'S JOURNAL, and a speech he gave at a CATO Institute function.

The essays vary greatly not just with regards to topics, but also with respect to the degree of humour, and some border on the serious. But all are interesting, as any P.J. O'Rourke fan would expect.

As O'Rourke states in the Introduction: "It is, I guess, interesting to watch the leftist grub weaving itself into the pupa of satire and then emerging a resplendent conservative blowfly."

Not the same side-splitting humor as Holidays in Hell
Much of P.J. O'Rourke's self-deprecating humor is funny, down-to-earth and insightful.But beware - when he writes in this manner he is joking on the level.So when you read the introduction to Age and Guile and see how low of an opinion he has of the material published in this book, TAKE HIS WORD FOR IT - THIS ISN'T VERY GOOD MATERIAL.If you're considering buying this book because you enjoyed P.J.'s other works, re-consider.This material earns at most an occasional, light chuckle and more frequently induces sleep.Some of P.J.'s other works, particularly Holidays in Hell, elicited much more appropriate reactions from this reader for a book with the word "humor" printed on the back cover.Several of P.J.'s travel essays from that book can be expected to cause the kind of painful laughter that makes it difficult to breathe, see or even stand, and in some readers will even cause loss of bladder control.So if you haven't read Holidays in Hell, then I recommend you buy that book instead of this one.Unless you're having trouble sleeping. ... Read more

Product Description
By the author of "All the Trouble in the World." This is a volume of previously uncollected pieces by P.J. O'Rourke, spanning his 25 years in journalism. The work ranges from 1970, when he wrote for the "Underground" and "National Lampoon", to his 1996 position on "Rolling Stone" magazine. ... Read more

Product Description
O'Rourke takes a look at a lighter side of overpopulation, famine, plague, multiculturalism, and other fashionable worries. 2 cassettes. ... Read more

Product Description
Compiled with the help of readers of The American Spectator an acerbic blacklist of some of the most disliked people of the 1990s includes such varied individuals as Sting, Gore Vidal, William Kuntsler, Noam Chomsky, Ralph Nader, and Peter, Paul, and Mary. Original. 100,000 first printing. $50,000 ad/promo. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

Every author writes one, I guess
I am a huge P.J. O'Rourke fan... his wit and level of penmanship stand him above his peers.However, unless you enjoy reading one hundred pages of names with the occasional cutting remark, I would skip this one.Of all his books, this is the only one I am not wildly enthusiastic about.

Pointless
This is, frankly, a terrible book. I'm a conservative, but I didn't find O'Rourke funny, clever, or insightful in the slightest. This book is exactly what it claims to be: a list. It is a sequence of long, boring lists of names, many of long-forgotten figures and celebrities. Explanations for the choices are rare, and superficial.

The essay about Carter at the end is mildly amusing, if trite. The "why I am conservative" is slightly better, but nothing most conservatives haven't already heard a thousand times before, in a more articulate manner.

I've never read O'Rourke before this. They say his other work is better. I certainly hope so.

not his best
The American Spectator is sadly gone now (what's left of it is called the American Prowler), a victim of its own overzealous pursuit of President Clinton and its
dalliance with the loathsome David Brock.But many of the best writers on the Right once wrote in its pages, among them P. J. O'Rourke.Mr. O'Rourke is one of
those writers who entertains us often enough that he can be forgiven for cashing in once in awhile, which is fortunate, because this is only barely a book.It starts with
a very funny column, A Call for a New McCarthyism (American Spectator, July 1989), in which he calls for a new blacklist.Unlike the McCarthy era list though :
"The distinguishing feature of this cluster of dunces is not subversion but silliness."And rather than barring these dunces from working and trying to hush up their
views, he has the more diabolical idea of exposing them and their ideas to the harsh light of day :

[T]he worst punishment for dupes, pink-wieners, and dialectical immaterialists might be a kind of reverse blacklist.We don't prevent them
from writing, speaking, performing, and otherwise being their usual nuisance selves.Instead, we hang on their every word, beg them
to work, drag them onto all available TV and radio chat shows, and write hundreds of fawning newspaper and magazine articles about their
wonderful swellness.In other words, we subject them to the monstrous, gross, and irreversible late-twentieth-century phenomenon of Media
Overexposure so that a surfeited public rebels in disgust.This is the 'Pia Zadora Treatment,' and, for condemning people to obscurity, it beats
the Smith Act hollow.

That's pretty funny stuff, but then you read the list and realize that almost all of the folks on it--Gore Vidal, Tom Hayden, Angela Davis, Amy Carter, Susan
Sarandon, Mike Farrell, Tikkun, Garry Trudeau, the Sheen brothers, etc.--faded into obscurity on their own; they were so awful they weren't even worthy enemies.
Unfortunately though, this initial essay was followed by six more installments (the last in November 1993) and some of these consist of nothing more than
nominations from readers and Mr. O'Rourke's comments on their nominations.It all gets pretty tiresome.

But then just as you're ready to toss the book on the trash heap, it's redeemed by two final pieces that were seemingly tacked on at the end just to flesh the book out to
150 pages.The first, 100 Reasons Jimmy Carter Was a Better President Than Bill Clinton (American Spectator, September 1993), is very funny.The second, Why I
Am a Conservative in the First Place (Rolling Stone, July 13-27, 1995), is not only amusing but also presents as good a defense of conservatism as you'll find
anywhere these days.In light of its title and the gist of the piece, it almost has to be read as a response to F. A. Hayek's famous libertarian essay, Why I Am Not a
Conservative.Hayek, who seems to have understand American conservatism not at all, wrote :

Let me now state what seems to me the decisive objection to any conservatism which deserves to be called such. It is that by its very nature
it cannot offer an alternative to the direction in which we are moving. It may succeed by its resistance to current tendencies in slowing down
undesirable developments, but, since it does not indicate another direction, it cannot prevent their continuance. It has, for this reason, invariably
been the fate of conservatism to be dragged along a path not of its own choosing. The tug of war between conservatives and progressives
can only affect the speed, not the direction, of contemporary developments. But, though there is a need for a "brake on the vehicle of progress,"
I personally cannot be content with simply helping to apply the brake. What the liberal must ask, first of all, is not how fast or how far
we should move, but where we should move. In fact, he differs much more from the collectivist radical of today than does the conservative.
While the last generally holds merely a mild and moderate version of the prejudices of his time, the liberal today must more positively oppose
some of the basic conceptions which most conservatives share with the socialists.

Mr. O'Rourke on the other hand, though often characterized as a libertarian, accepts the conservative label and his definition of conservatism :

The purpose of conservative politics is to defend the liberty of the individual and--lest individualism run riot--insist upon individual responsibility.

contains the all important corollary to liberty, that the price of our freedom must be that we each take responsibility for ourselves.Libertarianism's major fault is
that it insists on the former but refuses the latter.

On balance, the first and then the last two pieces make the collection marginally worthwhile.And Mr. O'Rourke does have to earn a living, so we'll not begrudge
too much the filler in between.

GRADE : B-

PJ-"TheBEST"
PjistheMasterofpoliticalinsight! Herethereadershelpouttoo. VivathenewRedScare! Themostappropriatebookfortheseschrilltimes.

Needs an Update
These side-splitting lists were first published in the late '80's andearly '90's.Since then, thanks to the Clinton administration the enemiesof freedom and democracy have multiplied like mosquitos.P.J., get back towork, please. ... Read more