Feeling good about government is like looking on the bright side

In the twilight of the modern world, when nations wrestle with their own creations and people look to government as both savior and scapegoat, the sharp-tongued satirist P. J. O’Rourke spoke words that gleam with both humor and truth: “Feeling good about government is like looking on the bright side of any catastrophe. When you quit looking on the bright side, the catastrophe is still there.” Though uttered in jest, these words carry the somber wisdom of the ancients. For O’Rourke, who witnessed the follies of politics with the eye of a philosopher disguised as a comedian, government was a necessary burden — a structure that manages chaos but can never cure it. His message is not one of despair, but of realism: that to expect perfection from government is to mistake the cure for the disease.

The origin of this quote lies in O’Rourke’s reflections on the size, scope, and limits of modern government. A writer famed for his biting wit and libertarian skepticism, O’Rourke lived through the great political dramas of the late twentieth century — from the bureaucratic sprawl of the welfare state to the moral crusades of global superpowers. He saw that every expansion of authority brought with it not the utopia its architects promised, but new layers of confusion, waste, and unintended consequence. His humor, like the laughter of a wise elder, was not mockery for its own sake but a defense against naivety. By comparing government to a catastrophe, he reminded his readers that no matter how prettily it may be dressed, no matter how noble its slogans, the machinery of power remains flawed and fallible — a structure built by imperfect men, and therefore bound to imperfection itself.

To understand his meaning, we must first understand the paradox of governance. Throughout history, people have turned to government in times of crisis, believing that order and prosperity could be engineered by decree. Yet again and again, the bright side of government action has revealed its shadow. Consider the grand promises of the French Revolution, which sought liberty and equality through the will of the state. At first, the people rejoiced in the birth of a new world — but soon the bright banners of freedom were stained with blood, and the guillotine became the symbol of progress. The catastrophe did not disappear; it simply changed form. So it is with all governments: they may attempt to solve the world’s problems, but they can never transcend the flawed nature of humanity from which they spring.

O’Rourke’s metaphor speaks to the danger of misplaced faith. When we “feel good about government,” we risk surrendering our vigilance. The ancients knew that power, once trusted too deeply, devours the very liberty it claims to defend. The philosopher Cicero, who lived through the fall of the Roman Republic, warned that the people who grow too comfortable under authority soon become its slaves. Rome, once the beacon of freedom, decayed beneath the weight of its own bureaucracy and corruption. And even as the empire crumbled, there were those who still “looked on the bright side,” praising the stability of tyranny while their liberties turned to dust. O’Rourke’s jest thus becomes a moral lesson: optimism unmoored from reality is not hope — it is denial.

Yet his words do not call for cynicism, but for clarity. The catastrophe of government is not that it exists, but that it is worshiped. O’Rourke did not despise governance; he despised idolatry — the belief that salvation can be legislated, that prosperity can be printed, or that virtue can be imposed by law. Government, at its best, is a tool — blunt, imperfect, but necessary. It is like a ship patched together from the wreckage of human ambition: it keeps us from drowning, but it was never meant to reach paradise. The wise man, therefore, neither curses the ship nor confuses it with heaven. He tends to its leaks, steers it carefully, and never forgets that it was built by hands like his own.

Consider the story of Hurricane Katrina in 2005, when the great city of New Orleans was swallowed by floodwaters. The government’s response — slow, confused, and crippled by bureaucracy — exposed the limits of centralized power. Promises were made, aid was delayed, and the people suffered. Yet amid the wreckage, communities rose up to help themselves — neighbors rescuing neighbors, strangers sharing food and shelter. In that moment, the truth of O’Rourke’s wisdom became flesh: the catastrophe remained, and government could not remove it; only the courage and compassion of individuals could. The bright side of government’s effort was not enough — the spirit of the people had to do what institutions could not.

The lesson, then, is this: never mistake comfort for security, nor government for salvation. It is right to hope for good governance, but folly to expect perfection. The wise citizen remains grateful for the order government provides, yet wary of the power it holds. He rejoices in progress but remembers that catastrophe — the chaos, corruption, and conflict of human nature — is always there, waiting for neglect to feed it. The strength of a nation does not lie in how brightly it praises its government, but in how fiercely it guards its freedom from it.

So let the words of P. J. O’Rourke echo as both laughter and warning: “Feeling good about government is like looking on the bright side of any catastrophe.” Do not surrender your reason to comfort. Do not blind yourself with the illusion that authority can save you. Build your life, your community, your future upon responsibility, not dependency. For governments may rise and fall, but the catastrophe of human imperfection endures — and only the free, the vigilant, and the self-reliant can stand unbroken amidst its ruins.