Saturday, February 19, 2022
Thursday, February 17, 2022
RIP P J O'Rourke
PJ O'Rourke passed away recently.
As mentioned previously, I am reluctant to honor the memory of famous people in this forum because famous people--those we like and those we don't and all those in between--die too often for this infrequent blogger to monitor and track.
PJ O'Rourke is different. PJ was one of my heroes. I would say that I have had fewer than 10 heroes in my life, but PJ was one of them. Recognizing that humor is subjective, I believe that O'Rourke is the funniest man I ever encountered. The National Lampoon Sunday Newspaper Parody (if that is its official title) has provided me with more laughs over the course of a lifetime than any movie, TV show, standup comedian, etc.
The very first article I read mirrored my feeling toward the writer and the man and I will link to it shortly. Compounding the melancholy were the summaries from the hyperpolitical who pissed on O'Rourke's memory and dissed his work because they hated O'Rourke's politics. For them, Nugent will never be a real guitarist and DiCaprio will always be more genuine than Eastwood. Oh, and Tom Brady sucked too.
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R.I.P. P.J. O’Rourke, who died yesterday at 74. He was a clever and entertaining writer who started out as the typical 60’s hippie into drugs, sex and rock and roll. But like many of us he got hijacked by taxes when he started making decent money as a Gonzo journalist for National Lampoon. He became Rolling Stone’s token conservative voice and was considered “conservative” for much of his career but later in life he converted to libertarianism. He had strong opinions, but his deeply held beliefs continued to evolve.
I’m still a bit irked with him for not supporting Trump – not because he had an ideological objection to his platform but because of his opinion of him as a person. I confess, I once thought like P.J.: if a person didn’t measure up to my moral standards and value system I vowed not to vote for them regardless of their promises. But that was before it became apparent that America, and the world, stood at a tipping point. At that point a flawed candidate headed down the correct path was far superior to another liberal/progressive dragging us towards serfdom.