P. J. O'Rourke Quotes

Congressmen are the only group in America who every two years have to go out and beg for their jobs.

If you look at the architecture of Washington, D.C., it is not by mistake that the dome over the Capitol is the very center of the federal city. The White House and the Supreme Court are set about us, satellites to the supreme power of the people expressed in the legislative authority of Congress.

When we get a chance to take part in elections, I am ready to fight for leading positions, including in the presidential vote.

Elections have consequences.

Political elections are not life and death.

Government is not a bottom line enterprise. You can get yourself elected ... but you can't fire the legislature if they won't do what you want.

Party leaders can't guarantee elections.

The House of Representatives is the center of power of the most powerful nation in the world.

The civil servant, the general or admiral, the foreign service officer has no authority to make policy. The act only as servants to the government and therefore they must remain in line with the government policy that is established by those that have been elected by the people to set that policy.

… presidents launch [military] campaigns with inadequate planning, and Congress feels no obligation to back them when things go awry. And because this takes place under the auspices of the non‐legal constitution, the judiciary cannot decide cases that set rules for the future, which allows the disasters to recur.

The fundamental division of powers in the Constitution of the United States is between voters on the one hand and property owners on the other.

I can't influence how other parties choose to vote.

How can we even call this a Democracy when the House, the Senate, the White House, and now the Supreme Court are all controlled by the representatives of a minority group in America?

I have grave concerns that the CIA search may have violated the separation of powers principle embodied in the United States Constitution.

May the hickory ramrods ram down the powder of equality into our national guns, and wadded well with the voices of the people to blow Clay in the mud.

What truly matters is not which party controls our government, but whether our government is controlled by the people.

I have enormous respect for people who do run for office.

Political systems are run by self-selecting politicians. We don't draft people; it's not jury duty.

Political campaigns offer Americans an opportunity to adjust direction, reaffirm values, and recommit to the covenant that binds them together.

Traditionally, in America, we have accountability as kind of a key feature of each branch of government in some way. So, you know, you obviously have to run for office. Or if you're a judge, you've got to be nominated by political officials and so on.

In America, we divide federal power between the legislative, executive and judicial branches so that no one holds too much power. This is sixth-grade civics: Congress writes the laws; the president executes the laws; and the courts apply those laws fairly and dispassionately to cases.

I've said that we need to elect Democrats from the school board to the Senate.

It is a president's constitutional right to nominate a Supreme Court justice, and it is the Senate's constitutional right to act as a check on a president and withhold its consent.

I think our democracy has it exactly right: two terms, eight years. It's enough. Because it's important to have one foot in reality when you have access to this kind of power.

We are a Republic with different branches of government, and so the Senate and the House are going to be full partners in working with the White House.