And ellen book tv, we would like to highlight some programs from our archives with political, p. J. Orourke. Over the past 20 years, if youre in a book be close to 20 times. For supplement 2007 our Monthly Program in depth, p. J. Orourke discusses politics writing in white his humor to address political and social issues. Is a real picture of you. P. J. Yes pretty i was i would guess that was 1971. The point positive. I think abortion left would be the easiest way to summon up. I was a leftwinger. But i did not make enough sense to actually be a communist or anything of that. Statement. The transformation occur. P. J. Is gradual. I can just wrote about this. There is a book coming out from the over institution. They are backing this. As cold why i turned right. Its a story bunch of us why we came became salons tournament tell it. Luckily the short version. I was a radical leftist. Very much in favor of marxist socialist. In america. I get a job. Paying 150 a week. I was a messenger in new york. 150 in a week has a lot of money as far as i was concerned. It was in the lower east side. Can i was broke. With the pain every two weeks. I was really looking forward to that 300 bucks. And so is my landlord. In my drug dealer. In a of other people. I think a big first paycheck. It was like 178 or something. Supposed to be 300. But after federal taxes, state taxes city taxes Social Security. Retirement fund which i really cared a lot about in those days. I said wait a minute, i have been advocating socialism. Marxism pretty communism. For years. In demonstrating in the streets. And we already have it. They just took have my paint predict what is going on here. They just took have my pay. We have socialism. And thats when i started to step out of it. It took a while. Speech of theres somebody also made a switch and the politics was christopher hitchens. P. J. Much more recently. Host but in 1993, heres what he had to say about you pretty. Is another x leftist. Sixtys radical, we fondly what its like to be bummed out and paranoid in the 60s. Annies been in this chip ever since. And is terrific humorous. For his books and essays in one, the first was quite funny. It was called reptile the second one was called holidays and help. And much better than any of my books have ever done. Meat town for an heres my him predict, yes, i met him. I hung out with him in a bar. Hes running on empty with his joke about i know ive been a radical now i see how full it would be completely buttoned up button down the joke basically turns on satire political correctness. If people want to make a joke about dates or triples. P. J. Orourke will will. This quite funny but not quite funny enough. Always getting away with murder. I might get away with slander. Verbal assault. I dont think ive even gotten away with just a little physical assault. [laughter]. So think he overstates the case. Also of course, im long past the point where i can claim to be the young republican pretty pleasant juggernauts. Im an old republican now. Unlike most middleaged guys. Coral republicans even if we sometimes color so Something Else like democrat. Host holidays and, is another p. J. Orourke book. All of the trouble in the world, modern enters. First book. When is this put out. 1983 was the first original look of it. Knowing the rich was what wound up as being adam smith. I was simply puzzled and i didnt understand why some countries are rich in other countries are poor. So i started poking around going to rich countries and poor countries and trying to see if i can figure it out by this country was rich others inc. Was from that experience that toby monday, the editor of globe clinic in england who came up with this idea that a series of books. Books that change the world. And my book on adam smith is one and christopher has one also. Rights of man. And very good it is. It was because of adam smith and poking around that toby asked me to write on adam smith. Host mississippi, go ahead. Hello. New jersey, go ahead pretty. I am not sure why p. J. Orourke need to be taken seriously and all of this time in your show when a man who i suspect never wore a uniform and a suspect from hearing about his politics and that mirror wouldve do was then his darndest to avoid wearing the uniform pretty so utterly flippant about war. We have a war now that we should not of had and i happen to been in republican for 50 years voting three times for nixon and fought for ronald reagan. Thousands of americans and killed. Many iraqis have been killed in no useful purpose to be served by the score. I think its vulnerable that mrf ward find something amusing about it but the question i wanted to ask ms. , he talks about free markets. Does mr. P. J. Orourke have any conception of what we have things like minimum wage law financial laws and does he remember the condition that it existed in america before we had those laws. And the laborers were obliged to work 12 hour day 60 weeks pretty is that what mr. P. J. Orourke thinks is freedom. Host mr. P. J. Orourke we will get to the free market question that he had. I was on the democratic line actually. In your dedication to give war a chance. Heres what you write. Like many men of my generation i had an opportunity to be a work champ promptly chickened out. Went to might not physical in 1970 with a doctors letter about my history of drug abuse. The litter was born have pages long three have pages devoted to listing the drugs i abuse and i was shattered into the office an army psychiatrist, to at the end of a 45 minute interview with me, was shouting your fw dont belong in the army. On it was certainly right in the first count and maybe in the second anyway didnt have to go but that meant somebody else to go in my place. I would like to dedicate this book to him. I hope you got back in one piece hello. I hope you work were used to your platoon mates than i wouldve been. I hope youre rich happy now. In 197170 puts me in in the face for being a longhaired peace group. I hope that with you. I got a couple of nice letters from the dedication. And people who thought they made had punch me in the face. P. J. So the beginning of what the fellow the phone said. Ive never asked anybody to take me seriously. As to making fun of for. Lets put it this way. A bad situation and more as a really rotten situation. Like a bad disease. Like death itself. Is it changed by what if you make fun of it or you dont. We make fun of things because we approve of them. Because they are cuddly and cute. Make fun of things in order to cope with our own terror and our own unease and existential horror. Our anger at god. Our disappointment with ourselves, etc. And so forth. Humor is a defense mechanism. You drink, becoming a joke. You can take drugs. You can make yourself all pompous and pious. We can do all of those things at once. Whether i make fun of work or not make fun of war, it will make it better or make it worse. As to free markets and minimum wage and people working in coal mines and looking 49 hours a day, 90s weight and so on and so forth. Interesting when you say you are in markets, you immediately get that response from lots of people. His other personal what adam smith meant. What adam smith was talking about was keeping corporation out of life. And out of marketplace is only one aspect of keeping corporation of life. Wealthy nations, the essays that he worked very important book that he wrote the theory of moral sentiments which is about morality. All about making people rely upon persuasion and to give up brute force. It is the core morality. The core of a free society and of democracy even though adam smith was semis did not know that pretty lived in a pretty democratic era. He did not quite understand democracy at work but he did understand freedom at work. He was a moral and practical and justifying of sympathetic advocate of freedom. And through freedom is persuasion. The idea they want free markets, does not mean that you want markets ruled by force. It does not mean ruled by nr creek. It would cause a rule of law. And it implies that we are all equal before that law. It does not tell us exactly how to conduct the exact rules. It tells us that there should be rules and all of a the roles. But it does say exactly what those rules are. On the wealth of nations, adam smith actually tries to lay down some rules. He tries to take his theories and make them prescriptive and actually give us political policy. He becomes a policy on. Its interesting. Its the one failed book. There are five books in the wealth of nations. What adam smith turns into a policy, becomes as foolish as the rest of us do we do that. I think that in this white house and likely will have this congress. So to the very angry caller. I would just like to say this. First i have no idea why three hours should be wasted on me. Because you have certain ideas about how freedom should be conducted may well be right and i respect those ideas and theyre worth arguing about. They may not be same ideas as i have pretty been told just because you want to limit the freedoms in the market, you may be and may be the correct thing to do to limit those freedoms. But, to be smug about your desire to limit freedom. Everybody wants to limit freedom from those who desire to be human slavery to the telamon. Two people who are in favor of minimum wage laws. Everybody is smug about their desire to limit human freedoms. Now some human freedoms really need to be limited. With that does not make you a good person recognizing that pretty or wise person or assuming. You deserve no smugness and you dont deserve to vent your anger foolish humorous. Just because you have some desire to limit so there. P. J. Orourke has appeared on book tv close to 20 times over the past 20 years. Im next he provides it an attribute to the american automobile. Driving like crazy. This event was held at the Peterson Automotive Museum in los angeles. In june of 2009. Host how shall we put this, sayonara to the american car. Megan automobile companies, gm and ford and chrysler, they will live on as a ghost dragging their chains and taxpayers expense. The fools in the corner officers and it unions they will retire to the vacation homes in palm beach and st. Petersburg prospectively. The trolls under the capitol dome in washington do. But, i pity the poor american car in congress and the white house get through with it. A lightweight vehicle, a small Carbon Footprint using alternative energy. In a sustainable way. When i was a kid we call the schwinn. [laughter]. s been a great and ten years. A great run, hundred ten brother since the brothers built the First American automobile. Similar megan company, defendant admitted success, springfield, massachusetts maybe todays motor city full of abandoned houses, drug dealing, Violent Crime and racial tensions. Which is it so happens, springfield, massachusetts is full of anyway. But, we owe the american car, a lot more than that entertaining spectacle of the fallen mayors. Many people my age we were very existence to the car. To the cars backseat. Where if you check out our parents wedding anniversary with our birthdates and combine them, a little too close to comfort, thats probably where we were conceived. There was no pre marital pretty true. You cannot sink a girl into the rec room a farmhouse, patient almanac, they do have a car so they can commute so they were to accommodate working on the farm. Here farmhouse didnt have a rec room because recreation had not yet been discovered due to all of the farm work. So the saturday night you can take a grande in the buggy but it was hard to get her into the mood to let you bust into her corset because you were to facing behind in the horse. Just kind of spoils the atmosphere. So the car let us out of the barn. Mother car was at it, it destroyed the American Nuclear family anyone who is headed in the American Nuclear family. And that was a relief to all concerned. And then america became paved. There much worse things they can do to a country and favorite. Ive always wondered whenever her thank you are thanks, allamerican paved from those kids in the body cast whom skateboard all of the time. The word of thanks. Cars provided america with an immutable standard of living. You cannot get a steady job with high wages in Health Benefits and working on the general Stock Corporation summary line putting unders on cows. Just can it be done. And i think that the american car was a source of intellectual stimulation. Think of the innovation. The invention. The sheer genius that transformed in 1908 model t ford into the 1968 shelby cobra gt500. In the course one single human lifetime closefitting tickets. Compare this to the progress in the previous mode of transportation. Ours production, horse design, unchanged for thousands of years. And when it comes to creativity with the horse. I actually did a Little Research on this when i was writing about the stuff really looked it up. Nobody thought to put mr. Up, nobody to hang a start from the saddle. Until about 580. Mr. Was invented. People have been riding horses for thousands of years and took them until 582 and fit this prayed where were they putting their feet. If automobile design and engineering have proceeded at the same pace as horse design and engineering, we would be powering ourselves down the road like Fred Flintstone with his feet in the floor of the car. Although can come to that in 2010 of the obama on mobile. Also important at all, was cars fulfilled the ideal of americas founding fathers. Of all of the truths we hold to be selfevident, of all of the unalienable rights in which we are in down pretty which one is most important to the american dream. It is right there, front and center flat in the name of the declaration of independence, freedom. Freedom to get out of town. Freedom to get out of here pretty king george, can i have the keys. Thats what the declaration of independence says. Not that tell you, the saga of the Work Incorporated some abstract matter to me. This is no subject of fanciful theories. Now nancy pelosi, she may think she was transported home from the Maternity Ward on pink fluffy clouds. So carbon sarah phone. But i know is the car coming tomorrow am. My grandfather jacob orourke. He was born in 1977. He was more than a farm about the size of this podium here. And im city, ohio, which is not a city. Didnt even have any line. Bernie is only accomplished aside from the tempers as anyone on the corn shuck stuffing up the poor mans roulette wheel the only thing that varney ever compass his life was he trained a pair of old nags to call him home dead drunk with drunk would fall out of the tavern, pass out in the wagon and horses would bring them home. That is what he accomplished in his life. Grandpa jake, he left home armed with a fifth. Education heading for the bright lights of toledo, ohio. He went to work as a buggy mechanic and then one day over swiss buggy pulled up at the shop and grandpa so that insult the future and he fixed that too. It didnt take grandpa long to realize cleaner hands were to be had in more money was to be made selling things instead of repairing them and also grandma and grandpas wedding anniversary were a little too close for comfort. So anyway he got into the car business and by the time i came along in the 1940s we had old work the weekend grandpa and my uncle owns a dealership in my father was a Sales Manager in dads younger brother drove it around and used car lot and my brother jack was a salesman. I ran the Parts Department and all the aunts and the girl cousins worked in the office and all the boy cousins worked out on the car lot cleaning and waxing the cars. Our soninlaw would go on to run the ohio Car Dealer Association and i would go on to do whatever it is that i do in this book writing about cars and stuff. Ill tell you even these dark days and the odd american automobile i wish this day would have taken over. Really to be on the the late night tv local car dealership ads, i got this whole idea that i wanted to do pirate pats Treasure Island buick and come up with a parrot on my shoulder and one of those big hats and eyepatch. One down the pirates patched Treasure Island where prices walk the plank. Dont miss our pieces at the car lot. Free chocolate doubloons for the kiddies. Grandpa died in 1960 honors from the rotary and kiwanis and lions club and moose lodge. My family without the car we couldnt. Them we wouldnt have food and stuff rid our history begins at the beginning of the american car hand by now some orourkes some of us have even gone to college. We didnt go far in college and we didnt do very well but thats where we went so i take the demise of the american car, i take this personally. Im looking around for somebody to blame but i am mad you know. I want to blame somebody like ralph nader. What fun it would be to jump on ralph nader with both feet and send a big marxist is this out of this cracked egghead. We should do that even though we were 75 and clearly insane but it took more than one man and his ignorant and ill written book on safe at any speed to wreck the most important industry in the nation. That was the corvair the ralph was attacking at unsafe at any speed and ralph was wrong about the corvair because my High School Growth in connie had the corvair and connie was the worst driver in the world. And one of the fastest and if connie couldnt get herself killed in a corvera couldnt be done so ralph was all right. The pundits are telling us theres plenty of blame to go around for the death of the american car card im not sure about that either. Now its true that the car executives are knuckleheads. Not all executives are knuckleheads. Look at bill gates. If you were worth a gazillion dollars wouldnt you go to a Barber College and get a decent 5dollar haircut . The mean come on. Labor Union Leadership is maddening but its one thing to be mad at the union labor leaders and its another thing to expect those Labor Union Leaders to be in the uaw hall standing on a chair yelling we demand less money from the bosses. Thats just not going to happen. Car workers make 600 an hour or so im told but every time a camel far too than the opec meeting may be their pay is too high. Not like they are getting that pay so i think to understand what doomed the american automobile we had to give up on economics and we have to turn to melodrama. You see politicians, journalists fin