Mort Sahl
I didn't think that anything is beyond humor - not profane humor, but a good, honest approach to humor.Collection: Humor
Washington couldn't tell a lie, Nixon couldn't tell the truth, and Reagan couldn't tell the difference.Collection: Truth
Professional comedians, surprisingly, have a lack of humor. They're insensitive to the insanity of our times.Collection: Humor
My life needs editing.Collection: Life
I was on stage last night, and I gave a medical report about Donald Trump. I said he was hospitalized for an attack of modesty.Collection: Medical
If you were the only person left on the planet, I would have to attack you. That's my job.
Liberals feel unworthy of their possessions. Conservatives feel they deserve everything they've stolen.
I never met a man I didn't like until I met Will Rogers.
I was always biting the hand that fed me. It was compulsive. Kennedy was very good to me, and I attacked him as soon as he was elected. I attacked him before he was elected.
When people write comedy from neutrality, it just gets kind of silly.
My humor was Victorian - and still is.
I'm a radical, and I always have been.
A conservative is someone who believes in reform. But not now.
Reagan won because he ran against Jimmy Carter. If he ran unopposed he would have lost.
There's a great feeling of powerlessness in America. When I express ideas to people, they say, 'That's terrific, but do you think it really counts?'
Women have everything they want, and they've never been so unhappy.
I was a writer. I couldn't sell anything, and the comedians were among the dumbest people I had ever met. They'd all say to me, 'The average man won't understand it.' You know, they're superior to the average man.
Comedians have to challenge the power. Comedians should be dangerous and devastating - and funny. That's the hardest part.
People tell me there are a lot of guys like me, which doesn't explain why I'm lonely.
I used to go to two movies every week for the Saturday matinee when I was a kid.
Too much comedy today is vulgar, not clever. I say that as a comedian and as a consumer.
Too often, these comedy guys now only care about getting on and then getting off and getting rich.
I dare say that if most comedians today, the gifted ones, were to sit down and write, they'd learn more about their craft. But what happens is they get out there before they learn what their viewpoint is, if any.
There are talented people along the way, although very few come to mind. They're not very daring. Part of the problem is that comedians don't want to overthrow anything. They want to join it.
I was afraid no one would laugh, and I wanted to pretend I wasn't noticing the audience. I didn't want the audience to get the idea I was telling a joke and waiting for a laugh.
I've arranged with my executor to be buried in Chicago. Because when I die, I want to still remain active politically.Collection: Chicago
One thing about being narrow-minded: you'll never be lonely.Collection: Lonely
There's a danger our fiscal bankruptcy might overtake our moral bankruptcy.Collection: Might
There were four million people in the American Colonies and we had Jefferson and Franklin. Now we have over 200 million and the two top guys are Clinton and Dole. What can you draw from this? Darwin was wrong.Collection: Two
Remember that no matter how selfish, how cruel, how unfeeling you have been today, every time you take a breath, you make a flower happy.Collection: Selfish
That feeling of hopelessness only serves your masters.Collection: Feelings
I'm for capital punishment. You've got to execute people. How else are they going to learn?Collection: Punishment
If you maintain a consistent political position long enough, you'll eventually be accused of treason.Collection: Long
In the forties, to get a girl you had to be a GI or a jock. In the fifties, to get a girl you had to be Jewish. In the sixties, to get a girl you had to be black. In the seventies, to get a girl you've got to be a girl.Collection: Girl
If someone were to ask me for a short cut to sensuality, I would suggest he go shopping for a used 427 Shelby-Cobra. But it is only fair to warn you that of the 300 guys who switched to them in 1966, only two went back to women.Collection: Cutting
When Obama ran, he said, We can change the world! The world: can you change it back?!Collection: Change
If anybody comes up to you and says, My kid is a conservative - why is that? you say, Remember in the 60′s when we told you if you kept using drugs your kids would be mutants?Collection: Kids
I don't believe in good people and bad people. I believe in the better parts of people.Collection: Believe
The fact is that you can't have a good relationship with a girl who hasn't settled things with her father.Collection: Girl
The bravest thing that men do is love women.Collection: Love
This matter of two sides to every question is bad logic and bad practice: sometimes there are no sides; sometimes there are a hundred.Collection: Practice
Nixon's the kind of guy that if you were drowning fifty feet off shore, he'd throw you a thirty foot rope. Then Kissinger would go on TV the next night and say that the President had met you more than half-way.Collection: Night
A Yuppie is someone who believes it's courageous to eat in a restaurant that hasn't been reviewed yet.Collection: Believe
I watched Ken Burns' Civil War series on PBS. My favorite segment is when Bob Hope entertains the troops at Gettysburg.Collection: War
Obama said he went to Libya because of his conscience. Did anyone ever wrestle with his conscience and lose?Collection: Libya
There's so much Botox around now that you can't tell when a Jewish girl is angry!Collection: Girl
We claim we believe in compassion, which is an abstract, and when it's personified we discredit the manCollection: Believe
There are Russian spies here now. And if we're lucky, they'll steal some of our secrets and they'll be two years behind.Collection: Years
I'm not a liberal, I'm a radical!Collection: Radical