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The Fact That I Didn't Finish School Left Me With A Lifelong Need To Prove That I'm Smart, Prove It To Myself, Maybe To The World. I [also] Needed To Be - Not The Center Of Attention - But I Needed To Be Able To Attract Attention When I Wanted It, Through My Stunts And My Fooling Around Physically With Faces Or Postures Or Voices I Would Do. Those Things Are Important Elements In The Drive Behind All Of This [my Career].

-George Carlin

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The Fact That I

George Carlin

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The Fact That I Didn't Finish School Left Me With A Lifelong Need To Prove That I'm Smart, Prove It To Myself, Maybe To The World. I [also] Needed To Be - Not The Center Of Attention - But I Needed To Be Able To Attract Attention When I Wanted It, Through My Stunts And My Fooling Around Physically With Faces Or Postures Or Voices I Would Do. Those Things Are Important Elements In The Drive Behind All Of This [my Career].

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If God Created Everything, He's Got A Serious Quality Control Problem.

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I Hate Dr Phil. Dr Phil Told Me To Express My Feelings, So I'm Expressing Them.

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Think Of How Strange We'd Look If All The Cuts, Burns, Scrapes, Bruises, Scratches, Bumps, Gashes, And Scabs We Ever Had Suddenly Reappeared On Our Bodies At The Same Time.

To My Way Of Thinking, There Is Every Bit As Much Evidence For The Existence Of Ufos As There Is For The Existence Of God. Probably Far More. At Least In The Case Of Ufos There Have Been Countless Taped And Filmed And, By The Way, Unexplained Sightings From All Over The World, Along With Documented Radar Evidence Seen By Experienced Military And Civilian Radar Operators.>>.

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How Is It Possible To Have A Civil War?

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Have You Ever Wondered Why Republicans Are So Interested In Encouraging People To Volunteer In Their Communities? It’s Because Volunteers Work For No Pay. Republicans Have Been Trying To Get People To Work For No Pay For A Long Time.

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I'm Kinda Like Herpes, I Just Keep Coming Back.

The Status Quo Sucks.

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If God Had Intended Us Not To Masturbate, He Would Have Made Our Arms Shorter.

I Have This Real Moron Thing I Do? It's Called Thinking.

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The Main Reason Santa Is So Jolly Is Because He Knows Where All The Bad Girls Live.

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If This Is The Best God Can Do, I'm Not Impressed.

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Some People Think That Words Can Injure The Psyche Or The Moral Fiber. And They Really Can't.

Looking Back, I Realize That My Life Has Been A Series Of Incidents Where One Person Has Said To Another, "get This Asshole Outta Here!"

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If We Could Just Find Out Who's In Charge, We Could Kill Him.

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The Us Army Has Announced That Although It Is True They Performed Mind-destroying Drug Tests On Hundreds Of Soldiers In The 1960s, None Of The Victims Have Been Promoted Beyond The Rank Of Lieutenant Colonel.

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People Are Dreaming If They Think They Have Rights. They've Never Had Rights. There's No Such Thing.

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This Is A Lttle Prayer Dedicated To The Separation Of Church And State. I Guess If They Are Going To Force Those Kids To Pray In Schools They Might As Well Have A Nice Prayer Like This: Our Father Who Art In Heaven, And To The Republic For Which It Stands, Thy Kingdom Come, One Nation Indivisible As In Heaven, Give Us This Day As We Forgive Those Who So Proudly We Hail. Crown Thy Good Into Temptation But Deliver Us From The Twilight's Last Gleaming. Amen And Awomen.

So I Live In Los Angeles, And It's Kind Of A Goofy Place. They Have An Airport Named After John Wayne. That Ought To Explain It. It Has A Charming Kind Of Superstitious Innocence.

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Writing Is Really Wonderful Art. A Lot Of This Is Discovery. A Lot Of Things Are Lying Around Waiting To Be Discovered And That's Our Job As Writers Is To Just Notice Them And Bring Them To Life.

Every Time You Use The Phrase All My Life It Has A Different Meaning.

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I Can Remember Staring At The Orphanage And Feeling Envy.

Weather Tonight: Dark. Turning Partly Light By Morning.

You Get Into Your Teens, Now They Can't Hold You Back. You Jump To The Next Number, Or Even A Few Ahead.

Movies And Television Don't Make You Violent; All They Do Is Channel The Violence More Creatively.

I Like To Write Without Being Stoned. I Like To Have A Hit Or Two And Then Go Punch Up The Writing. I Just See Different Things And Hear Different Things. But It's Nice To Be Working From The Base That I Wrote Originally And Then Come To It With A Little Buzz. I Can Have A Little Wine From Time To Time. I Have A Hit From Time To Time, But Those Are The Only Things I Do.

I Kind Of Like It When A Lot Of People Die, And On The Other Hand I Always Wonder How Many Unused Frequent-flier Miles They Had.

The Wisest Man I Ever Knew Taught Me Something I Never Forgot. And Although I Never Forgot It, I Never Quite Memorized It Either. So What I’m Left With Is The Memory Of Having Learned Something Very Wise That I Can’t Quite Remember.

They'll Get It All From You Sooner Or Later 'cause They Own This F**kin' Place. It's A Big Club And You Ain't In It. You And I Are Not In The Big Club. By The Way, It's The Same Big Club They Use To Beat You Over The Head With All Day Long When They Tell You What To Believe. All Day Long Beating You Over The Head With Their Media Telling You What To Believe, What To Think And What To Buy. The Table Is Tilted, Folks. The Game Is Rigged And Nobody Seems To Notice. Nobody Seems To Care. Good, Honest, Hard-working People: White Collar, Blue Collar, It Doesn't Matter What Color Shirt You Have On.

I Quit School In Ninth Grade, Even Though I Was Good At The Studies. I Knew I Didn't Need School For What I Wanted.

You Know The Good Part About All Those Executions In Texas? Fewer Texans.

With The Proper Training, I Could've Been An Evil Genius.

I Believe Myself To Be A Worthwhile And Inventive Performer In My Own Right. [and] I Want To Be Known For What I Do Best.

If A Word Is Misspelled In The Dictionary, How Would We Ever Know? If Webster Wrote The First Dictionary, Where Did He Find The Words? Why Is 'phonics' Not Spelled The Way It Sounds? How Come Abbreviated Is Such A Long Word?

Where Do We Get Our Values From?

Mother's Milk Leads To Everything.

People Can't Seem To Get It Through Their Heads That There Is Never Any Healing Or Closure. Ever. There Is Only A Short Pause Before The Next "horrifying" Event. People Forget There Is Such A Thing As Memory, And That When A Wound "heals" It Leaves A Permanent Scar That Never Goes Away, But Merely Fades A Little. What Really Ought To Be Said After One Of These So-called Tragedies Is, "let The Scarring Begin.

When You Step On The Brakes Your Life Is In Your Foot's Hands.

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Shopping And Buying And Getting And Having Comprise The Great American Addiction. No One Is Immune. When The Underclass Riots In This Country They Don't Kill Policemen And Politicians, They Steal Merchandise. How Embarrassing.

Never Forget That Hitler Was A Catholic.

You Know What I Like About The American Form Of Government? They've Worked Things Out So That You're Never Far From A 7-eleven.

I'm Not Collegial, I Don't Hang Out. I'm Soloist, I Like My Solitude, I Don't Really Hang Around With Comedians.

They're Only Words. You Can't Be Afraid Of Words That Speak The Truth, Even If It's An Unpleasant Truth.

Freedom Of Speech

Speak The Truth

I Tell Ya, If I Hadn't Chosen The Career Of Being A Performer, I Think Linguistics Would Have Been A Natural Area That I'd Have Loved - To Teach It, Probably, Language Has Always Fascinated Me. There's A Genetic Inheritance There A Good Language Gene, Which I Inherited [from My Mother And Grandfather] And She Fostered That In Me As He Fostered That In Her.

Just When I Discovered The Meaning Of Life, They Changed It.

Military Cemeteries Around The World Are Packed With Brainwashed Dead Soldiers Who Were Convinced God Was On Their Side. America Prays For God To Destroy Our Enemies. Our Enemies Pray For God To Destroy Us. Somebody's Gonna Be Disappointed! Somebody's Wasting Their Time! Could It Be.. Everyone?

You Know Something I Could Really Do Without? The Space Shuttle. ... It's Irresponsible. The Last Thing We Should Be Doing Is Sending Our Grotesquely Distorted Dna Out Into Space.

Never Give Up On An Idea Simply Because It Is Bad And Doesn't Work.

I Was A Loner As A Child. I Had An Imaginary Friend - I Didn't Bother With Him.

Oh Beautiful For Smoggy Skies, Insecticided Grain, For Strip-mined Mountain's Majesty Above The Asphalt Plain. America, America, Man Sheds His Waste On Thee, And Hides The Pines With Billboard Signs, From Sea To Oily Sea.

Surround Yourself With What You Love.

Surround Yourself

More People Write Poetry Than Read It.

That's The Whole Meaning Of Life, Isn't It? Trying To Find A Place For Your Stuff.

Meaning Of Life

Property Is Theft. Nobody "owns" Anything. When You Die, It All Stays Here.

That's Basically What The Drive Is: "i Want To Be Famous, I Want To Be Noticed, And I Want To Be Approved Of." That's Basically What You're After. "give Me Attention, Give Me Applause, Give Me An Audience. A. A. A. Straight As." That's All You're Looking For.

All The Media And The Politicians Ever Talk About Is Things That Separate Us, Things That Make Us Different From One Another

As Far As I'm Concerned, Humans Have Not Yet Come Up With A Belief That's Worth Believing.

If You Want To Get Rid Of Counterfeit Money, Put It In The Collection Plate At Church.

To Me The Cynics Are The Ones In The Boardrooms With The Reports From The Focus Groups.

Sex Always Has Consequences. When Hitler's Mother Spread Her Legs That Night, She Effectively Canceled Out The Spreading Of Fifteen To Twenty Million Other Pairs Of Legs.

A House Is Just A Place To Keep Your Stuff While You Go Out And Get More Stuff.

I Often Warn People: "somewhere Along The Way, Someone Is Going To Tell You, 'there Is No "i" In Team.' What You Should Tell Them Is, 'maybe Not. But There Is An "i" In Independence, Individuality And Integrity.

I Was Once Dancing With A Woman Who Told Me She Had A Yeast Infection So I Told Her To Bake Me Some Bread.

I Credit That Eight Years Of Grammar School With Nourishing Me In A Direction Where I Could Trust Myself And Trust My Instincts. They Gave Me The Tools To Reject My Faith. They Taught Me To Question And Think For Myself And To Believe In My Instincts To Such An Extent That I Just Said, "this Is A Wonderful Fairy Tale They Have Going Here, But It's Not For Me."

The Following Statement Is True. The Previous Statement Is False.

Bowling Is Not A Sport Because You Have To Rent The Shoes.

I Don't Think We Really Gave Barbarism A Fair Try.

Never Underestimate The Role Pretension Plays When It Comes To Creating Euphemistic Language.

Not Only Do I Not Know What's Going On, I Wouldn't Know What To Do About It If I Did.

I Don't Own A Camera, So I Travel With A Police Sketch Artist.

Christians Worship A Dead Jew On A Stick

Most People With Low Self-esteem Have Earned It.

So You Become 21, Turn 30, Push 40, Reach 50 And Make It To 60.

In The United States, Anybody Can Be President. That's The Problem.

Never Get On An Airplane If The Pilot Is Wearing A Hat That Has More Than Three Pastel Colors.

I Worry About My Judgment When Anything I Believe In Or Do Regularly Begins To Be Accepted By The American Public.

[on School Uniforms] Don't These Schools Do Enough Damage Making All These Kids Think Alike, Now They Have To Make Them Look Alike Too? It's Not A New Idea, Either. I First Saw It In Old Newsreels From The 1930s, But It Was Hard To Understand Because The Narration Was In German.

As Powerful As Anyone May Claim God To Be, Somehow He Always Needs Money.

I Did A Lot Of Thinking, And Used Mental Activity To Relieve Whatever Feelings I Had. I Became Very Left-brained, And I Was Good In School. That Is, I Was A Smart Kid.

When You're High, It's Easy To Kid Yourself About How Clever Certain Mediocre Pieces Of Material Are.

I Don't Believe There's Any Problem In This Country, No Matter How Tough It Is, That Americans, When They Roll Up Their Sleeves, Can't Completely Ignore.

If A Painting Can Be Forged Well Enough To Fool Experts, Why Is The Original So Valuable?

I Hope We're Not Just Human Garbage Drifting Toward A Big Sewer. But I Think So.

Before They Give You A Lethal Injection, They Swab Your Arm With Alcohol. It's True. Well, They Don't Want You To Get An Infection, And You Can See Their Point. They Don't Want Some Guy Go To Hell And Be Sick.

You Don’t See Many Of These White Anti-abortion Women Volunteering To Have Any Black Fetuses Transplanted Into Their Uterus’s, Do You? No, You Don’t See Them Adopting A Whole Lot Of Crack Babies, Do You? No, That Might Be Something Christ Would Do.

Granola Didn't Sell Very Well When It Was Good For You. Now It Has Caramel, Chocolate, Marshmallow, Saturated Fat And Sweeteners With A Small Amount Of Oats And Grains. Sales Picked Up.

As It Stands Right Now, I Lead Richard Pryor In Heart Attacks, Two To One. However, Richard Still Leads Me, One To Nothing, In Burning Yourself Up.

People Who See Life As Anything More Than Pure Entertainment Are Missing The Point.

What Hair Color Do They Put On The Driver's Licenses Of Bald Men?

Leftovers Make You Feel Good Twice. First, When You Put It Away, You Feel Thrifty And Intelligent: 'i'm Saving Food!' Then A Month Later When Blue Hair Is Growing Out Of The Ham, And You Throw It Away, You Feel Really Intelligent: 'i'm Saving My Life!'

For An Entertainer, Part Of The Thing You Do Is Just Style. And The Coke Did Help Me Get Into Great Runs Of Pure Form.

Praying Is Begging For An Unseen Deity To Alter The Laws Of Nature For Someone Admittedly Unworthy.

He Is Dead Now, But He Meant Well.

It's Legal For Men To Be Floorwalkers And Illegal For Women To Be Streetwalkers.

We [americans] Are Not A Freedom-loving People In The Beautiful, Spiritual Sense. We Have An Inspiring Constitution, But We're A Hardhearted People.

That Invisible Hand Of Adam Smith Seems To Offer An Extended Middle Finger To An Awful Lot Of People.

As Much As I Love My Family, I Enjoy It When The House Is Empty, Because Then I Know I'm Truly Alone, As We All Are On The Planet, After All. Every Atom In Us Is Originally From A Star. And During My Moments Of Aloneness, I'm Most Mindful Of That; That I'm Just Another Group Of Matter Randomly But Wonderfully Arranged. That's When I Feel My Immortality.

I Love My Family

History Is Not Happenstance: It Is Conspiratorial. Carefully Planned And Executed By People In Power.

Primitive Societies, Or Social Groupings, Had Shamans, And Some Of Them Even More Recent In Time. Shamans Were Tricksters. There Was A Tradition Of The Trickster, And The Trickster Was A Clown, A Humorous Fellow. His Task Was To Trick The Gods, To Humor The Gods Into Laughing, So That There Was Access To The Divine - Because Laughter Is A Moment When We Are Completely Ourselves.

Hard Work Is A Misleading Term. Physical Effort & Long Hours Do Not Constitute Hard Work. Hard Work Is When Someone Pays You To Do Something You'd Rather Not Be Doing. Anytime You'd Rather Be Doing Something Other Than The Thing You're Doing...you're Doing Hard Work.

My Mother And Her Plans For My Future. She Had It All Worked Out. I Would Attend A Nice College, Then Get A Job In Advertising. "you'll Be One Of Those Smart-looking Fellows In Their Madison Avenue Suits." And I Rebelled Against [my Mother] And Her Values And Her Plans For My Future At Every Opportunity.

It's Depressing To See Blacks Wanting To Dive Into The Mainstream Of American Commercial Life. They Come From A Magnificent African Culture Based On Aesthetics, And They All Want To Become Fort Builders Like The Vicious People Who Originally Enslaved Them.

Politicians Are Put There To Give You The Idea That You Have Freedom Of Choice. You Don't.

Someone Once Said, If You Scratch A Cynic, And You'll Find A Disappointed Idealist. That Really Rang A Bell With Me - Because I Recognized That, Within Me, There Is This Flame, Of Wishing It Were Better, Wishing People Had Better Lives, That There Was More Of An Authentic Sharing And Harmony With Nature.

Think Of How Stupid The Average Person Is, And Realize Half Of Them Are Stupider Than That.

One Can Never Know For Sure What A Deserted Area Looks Like.

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Aleksandar Hemon

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