Who's Looking Out for You?

Well, it’s 5:30am.  I’ve been trying to sleep since about 2, but haven’t been able to fall asleep.  At this point, it looks like I’ll just have to stay up all night so I can be tired tomorrow night.  Anyway I decided to finish reading Who’s Looking Out for You? in an attempt to get tired / pass time.

I highly recommend this book.  For one thing, O’Reilly’s no-nonsense attitude and writing style make it both enjoyable and really easy to read.  It’s also stinking hilarious.  Though there’s lots of good, sound advice to be found in the book, it’s presented through personal anecdotes from his life, like spats between O’Reilly and the various news outlets he’s worked for (those spats often being the result of his ego or youthful foolishness).  The final chapter in particular is really interesting: it’s about the 3 biggest mistakes he’s ever made, but in explaining them, he sort of explains how he went from being just some Irish Catholic kid in New York to becoming a famous and influential American.

Here are a few quotes from the book:

  This book is for everyday Americans who are fighting the good fight... If you are going to drink a quart of bourbon a day or smoke crack, this book is not going to help you.  In fact, if you are in the above category, you’ve probably stolen this book.  Give it back.  Now. (p. 3)

  It’s important for all Americans to recognize that only good people can really look out for you.  Bad people are looking out for themselves and will use you.  They will pretend to have your best interests at heart but will kick you in the head when your usefulness to them expires...
  So my premise is simple -- before you can find help in this world, you have to develop qualities that are respected by good people.  If you are selfish, shallow, money-grubbing, manipulative, callous, violent, petty, envious, gossipy, or self-destructive, then you will soon be on your own.  Nobody will ever look out for you with the possible exception of your mom.  She is compelled by nature to do so. (p. 21)

  In the end, you are not what you eat.  Rather, you are whom you associate with.  If you run around with despicable people, the heavy odds are that you are despicable as well. (p. 30)

  When Prime Time Live did a segment on me, correspondent Chris Cuomo must have asked me twenty times, "Why are you so angry?"
  "Because every journalist should be angry," I answered.  "Reporters are in a position to expose corruption and deceit in high places.  But in order to do that you have to be annoyed about corruption and deceit.  If you’re a journalist and you’re not angry about social injustice, get out.  Be a barber."
  But Cuomo, son of the former governor of New York, seemed doubtful.  He kept questioning me about my financial status, my success, my good life.  How could I still be angry when I had such big success? he persisted.
  What can I say?  Corruption, unfairness, incompetence, obsequiousness, and exploiting the folks have always made me mad.  No amount of money in my pocket will douse that fire.  You are either angry about social injustice or you’re not. (p. 105)

  In 1781, Jefferson said the following words, which are engraved on the Jefferson Memorial in Washington: "God who gave us life gave us liberty.  Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God?"...
  Here’s how ridiculous this whole thing is: At McKinley High School in Honolulu, an official school poem has been recited on ceremonial occasions since 1927.  One of the lines mentions a love for God.  After the ACLU threatened a lawsuit, that poem was banned from public recitation, a seventy-five year tradition dissolved within a few weeks.
  This is tragic insanity.  To any intellectually honest person, it is apparent that the Founders wanted very much to keep God in the public arena, even uppermost in the thoughts of the populace.  What the Founders did not want was any one religion imposed by the government. (p. 114)

  Sincere dissent should always be respected.  But if you put yourself out there and you make a mistake, admit it.  Don’t do what the Dixie Chicks did.  Don’t speak provocatively about a subject you don’t know much about and then claim, "Well, I have the freedom to say what I want."
  That’s true, but that’s stupid... the result will be that some fans will no longer support her commercial enterprises.
  Remember, the Constitution gives you the right to be a moron.  And millions of us exercise that right all the time.  But sometimes there is a price to be paid. (p. 157)

  Without a doubt, the number one problem among minority Americans is the collapse of the family... The rise in the percentage of children born out of wedlock has corresponded with the rise of secularism in America.  There is no question about that.  As late as the 1970s, there was a certain stigma imposed by society on a woman who got pregnant outside of marriage.  No longer.  Now it’s "baby on board," and if no father is around to support it, hey, it’s none of our business.  The hell it isn’t.  The epidemic of out-of-wedlock kids is the primary source of poverty and social problems in this country.  We all pay for that.
  The statistics are brutal... Nearly 69 percent of African-American babies are now born to single mothers.  For black women ages fifteen to twenty-four, that figure is an astounding 89 percent!  That is simply a cultural collapse on an unprecedented scale for a developed country.  Just the fact that nearly all black girls and young women having babies today are unmarried is enough to ensure social chaos within the African-American community for generations to come.  A child without a secure support system will most likely be unable to compete with a child who has one.  Thus the cycle of hopelessness and deprivation will continue.
  So let me ask you this question.  When was the last time you heard Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton or even Colin Powell address this issue?  When was the last time the elite media pointed it out to you? (pp. 177-178)

I am as loyal as I am annoying. (p. 195)

The solution to toxic people is simple but difficult.  You must divert yourself away from them.  Once again it comes down to discipline.  If the fruit tastes good but you bleed after eating it, you’ve got to dine elsewhere or be drained all the time. (p. 202)

If you never learn how to think, if you drop out of high school, if you refuse to develop your intellect by reading and engaging in serious discussions, then you will not be able to compete in modern America... I see kids all the time who are just about doomed by age sixteen because they don’t know anything, and worse yet, they don’t want to know anything. (p. 207)

Then there’s your body to attend to.  We all get one, and most of us abuse the heck out of it.  Why?  What is this all about?  We pour intoxicating pollutants into our bodies, we pierce and tattoo them, we gorge on terrible food and then don’t go to the doctor to gauge the damage.  This is insane... Nobody can look out for you if you’re a physical wreck.  If you are grossly overweight or underweight, don’t bathe regularly, refuse to go to the dentist, or do a myriad of other things that will hurt your body, no one can do anything for you.  You will, inevitably, pay a painful price. (pp. 207-208)

So I didn’t really quote any of the anecdotes there, because they’re mostly somewhat too long to quote.  But there are lots of them and they’re really interesting, and usually funny too.  So anyway go buy the book.  It’s good.