Government proposes, bureaucracy disposes. And the bureaucracy must dispose of government proposals by dumping them on us.
P. J. O'RourkeRead
Maybe a nation that consumes as much booze and dope as we do and has our kind of divorce statistics should pipe down about "character issues."
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote suggests that a society with many vices should not criticize others for character flaws.
P. J. O'Rourke's quote highlights the hypocrisy in a nation that indulges in alcohol, drugs, and experiences high divorce rates while judging the character of others. It points to a broader commentary on societal norms and the inconsistencies in moral judgment when the society itself exhibits significant flaws.
Themes
SocietyHypocrisyCharacterJudgmentVices
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion on societal norms at a community gathering.
More from P. J. O'Rourke
All quotes →Always read something that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.
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Predicting innovation is something of a self-canceling exercise: the most probable innovations are probably the least innovative.
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I spend my days kneeling in the muck of language, feeling around for gooey verbs, nouns, and modifiers that I can squash together to make a blob of a sentence that bears some likeness to reason and sense.
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Anyone who thinks he has a better idea of what's good for people than people do is a swine.
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The idea of a news broadcast once was to find someone with information and broadcast it. The idea now is to find someone with ignorance and spread it around.
P. J. O'RourkeRead
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