Hilarious. Read all the way to the end. Classic.

An Alternative Inaugural Address
From the January 24, 2005 issue: What if George W. Bush weren't a compassionate conservative . . .
by P.J. O'Rourke
01/24/2005, Volume 010, Issue 18


MY FELLOW AMERICANS, I had intended to reach out to all of you and bring a divided nation together. But I changed my mind. America isn't divided by political ethos or ethnic origin. America isn't divided by region or religion. America is divided by jerks. Who wants to bring a bunch of jerks together with the rest of us? Let them stew in Berkeley, Boston, and Ann Arbor.

The media say that I won the election on the strength of moral values. If the other fellow had become president, would the media have said that he won the election on the strength of immoral values? For once the media would have been right.

We are all sinners. But jerks revel in their sins. You can tell by their reaction to the Ten Commandments. Post those Ten Commandments in a courthouse or a statehouse, in a public school or a public park, and the jerks go crazy. Why is that? Christians believe in the Ten Commandments. So do Muslims. Jews, too, obviously. Show the Ten Commandments to Hindus, Buddhists, Confucians, or to people with just good will and common sense and nobody says, "Whoa! That's all wrong!"

But jerks take issue with every one of the Ten Commandments. Jerks are particularly offended by the first two Commandments. Of course people of faith, decent people, differ on interpretations of the first two Commandments. For example, we don't all agree about the meaning of "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image." However, we do all agree about "Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them" when them is Freud, Marx, and Dan Rather.

"Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain." How many times, over the last few months, have we heard, "Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod, I can't believe George Bush won"?

"Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy." Let's be fair about this. We did see a lot of white, non-Hispanic Democrats in churches in 2004. But they were all running for president. And the churches were inner-city black churches. I happen to know that there are churches in the white, non-Hispanic suburbs where these Democrats live. Apparently jerks can't find them.

"Honor thy father and thy mother." Are telling lies about a bankrupt Social Security system and trying to block its privatization reform ways to do this?

"Thou shalt not kill." Why, in the opinion of jerks, is it wrong to kill a baby but all right to kill a baby that's so little he hasn't been born yet? And why do the same jerks who favor abortion oppose the death penalty? We can imagine people so full of loving kindness that they can accept neither the abortionist nor the executioner. We can even imagine people so cold-hearted that they embrace them both. But it takes a real jerk to argue in favor of killing perfect innocents and letting Terry Nichols live.

"Thou shalt not commit adultery." The jerks have begun praising marriage lately. But only if the bride and groom each have a beard.

"Thou shalt not steal." In 2004 the United States government spent $2,318,800,000,000. Thus every American benefited from $7,919.37 worth of federal services. Let me ask the jerks something. Say you're average jerks, a "blended family" of four. Did you pay $31,677.48 in taxes last year? If you didn't, you took things from other Americans. What did you give in return?

"Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor." Especially not in return for vast wealth, abundant prizes, and lavish praise from fellow jerks. I'm talking to you, Michael Moore.

And then there is the Tenth Commandment. "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbor's." The Ten Commandments are God's basic rules about how we should live--a brief list of sacred obligations and solemn moral precepts. The first nine Commandments concern theological principles and social law. But then, right at the end, is "Don't envy your buddy's cow." How did that make the top ten? What's it doing there? Why would God, with just ten things to tell Moses, choose as one of those things jealousy about the starter mansion with in-ground pool next door?

Yet think how important the Tenth Commandment is to a community, to a nation, indeed to a presidential election. If you want a mule, if you want a pot roast, if you want a cleaning lady, don't be a jerk and whine about what the people across the street have--go get your own.

The Tenth Commandment sends a message to all the jerks who want redistribution of wealth, higher taxes, more government programs, more government regulation, more government, less free enterprise, and less freedom. And the message is clear and concise: Go to hell.

P.J. O'Rourke is a contributing editor to The Weekly Standard and author, most recently, of Peace Kills (Atlantic Monthly Press).


© Copyright 2005, News Corporation, Weekly Standard, All Rights Reserved.

Wow.

I didn't like a damn thing about that piece, PJ, and I usually kinda dig your work.

--PD

PJ to me is just like Moore. He has at times some really good insightful things to say, but does it in a way that makes him come off as arogent and a bit of a nut. I chuckled at a couple things in here, but all in all it was a bit weak.

Peace Kills has some of these moments too, where your like, um, next page please. But at certain parts, your on the floor in laughter due to the irony or truth in his writing. Just like MM, he's the hit and miss type.

I always found it a bit funny that God thought profanity was worse than murder. Even if the ten commandments were a "stream of consciousness thing" from ol' Yahweh, simple little blasphemy occurred to him (her?) first. Murder's way down there at number 6; "oh yeah...don't kill anyone!".

The commandments are not sequenced in accordance with their importance. Christians also believe that a sin is a sin, so all "wrongdoings" are essentially equal. This conflicts with the rationale of most individuals because it doesn't take into account the circumstances surrounding the matter, which we feel important.

In regards to PJ, he can be quite funny and insightful. But this article failed to entertain or enlighten me (I disagreed with every point he made).

Yeah, I don't know if he was trying to speak in GWB's voice or what, but he didn't really pull off whatever he was getting at here. Something about characterizing anyone who disagrees with the Ten Commandments as a "jerk" just struck me as, well, kinda retarded.

--PunkDavid

Yeah, I feel as if he exhausted himself trying to convince me that the seperation of church and state isn't necessary (he failed by the way).

On a related note check out the discussion I had this afternoon in the "Honest to God..." thread of N & D.

I think the jist of it was PJ's disgust for liberals. Sorry.

Just too lazy to elaborate?

I'd love to know how the former is wrong. Do you just roll you eyes whenever someone finds you advertising your ignorance?

An A for histrionics, certainly.
I was expecting an impassioned recitation on the true meaning of the 3rd commandment. Yours was pretty good, though.
Carry on, then.

I am not sure the former was worded perfectly, by "we" I meant those of us who are not Christian.

And please, I just felt my post warrented at the very least a rational response. As for the true meaning of the 3rd commandment, 42.

This reminds me of something I heard Jim Wallis (author of God's Politics : Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It) say recently. I don't have the exact quote, but it was along the lines of, why is abortion and gay marriage the only "moral" values being judged lately? Many people who are religious view caring for poverty-stricken individuals as moral, protecting the environment as moral, and peace as moral. Everyone is pro moral values. Why did this ever become an issue?

Because when a Democrat gets a blowjob, a Republican prays he'll win the next election because he's got better morals. And when a Republican starts a war, a Democrat says he's a plain spoken family man, allbeit in iambic pentameter.

Come on man, there is a big difference between someone who admits to being an editorial writer, and someone who pretends to be a documantarian(not sure if that is a word, but we get the point). Also PJ is not exclusively a right wing nut ball, unlike Moore who is a left wing nut ball. O'rourke is pretty much Libertarian, with some right wing leanings. Very different from Moore who is anti whatever the hell is going on that day.

As for the actual article I love it, and I think a lot of people are missing the point. This isn't a pro religion article, but an anti "who actually wastes their time attacking stupid shit article." The ten commandments despite anyones relgion, are decent rules to live by. Yes there are a couple that are a bit ridiculous, as he points out, but really what sane person is actually offended by any of them?

But really he isn't taking the Ten Commandments literally, he is discussing them satiraclly. Actually this is probably the anti Carlin article. What he is talking about is virtue. And how, only a jerk would attack virtue.

With all due respect, I think the Ten Commandments are very good target to attack, especially when affixed to a public building. As we discussed in depth here a few weeks ago, only three of the Ten are directly related modern law and therefore virtually indisputable morality, and only two or three others are even related to morals, morals which, by the way, can be disputed by reasonable people.

As for O'Rourke being a libertarian, he may be, but this piece seems far from libertarian in its thrust. I think that libertarians ought to stick with basing their arguments on the Constitution instead of even older and MORE dated documents.

--PunkDavid

And while those morals are debatable, the application and relevance of the Ten C's are also debatable. If a state adopts a monument for a religous figure like Martin Luther King, Jr., then it sure as hell better be able to allow the display of the Ten Commandments. Jews, Christians, Muslims... all these groups share that part of the Old Testament in common. It's secular America that can't deal with them.

The argument against virtue is weak enough as it is without aetheists ironically believing in nothing.

This is a tired debate. I've made my points, you've made yours. I'd rather see everything expressed than people being told they can't do certain things. I can't believe anyone else would see it otherwise.

Crossover from that other thread, I don't consider MLK to be a religious figure simply because he was an ordained minister. People didn't follow him because he was a preacher, they followed him because he was fighting for civil rights.


And secular America is somehow less entitled to their opinion because...



People can do and say anything they want in regards to religion, it's the government that is bound by the Constitution.

--PunkDavid