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I Am America

by Stephen Colbert · 2007

Congratulations--just by opening the cover of this book you became 25% more patriotic. From Stephen Colbert, the host of television's highest-rated punditry show The Colbert Report, comes the book to fill the other 23½… more

30 quotes ★ 3.90 (84,806) Nonfiction

Quotes from the Book

Tomorrow you're all going to wake up in a brave new world, a world where the Constitution gets trampled by an army of terrorist clones, created in a stem-cell research lab run by homosexual doctors who sterilize their instruments over burning American flags. Where tax-and-spend Democrats take all your hard-earned money and use it to buy electric cars for National Public Radio, and teach evolution to illegal immigrants. Oh, and everybody's high!
A father has to be a provider, a teacher, a role model, but most importantly, a distant authority figure who can never be pleased. Otherwise, how will children ever understand the concept of God?
Look, PETA! If God hadn't wanted us to eat animals, he wouldn't have made them so darn tasty!
All Dogs Go To Heaven? Sorry, kids. It's only the dogs who've accepted Christ.
America used to live by the motto "Father Knows Best." Now we're lucky if "Father Knows He Has Children." We've become a nation of sperm donors and baby daddies.
Baby carrots are making me gay.
Clearly, America has no shortage of metaphorical opportunities for the poor.
The more you know, the sadder you get.
So if animals aren't our friends, then what are they? The answer can be summed up between two buns.
I am no fan of books. And chances are, if you're reading this, you and I share a healthy skepticism about the printed word. Well, I want you to know that this is the first book I've ever written, and I hope it's the first book you've ever read. Don't make a habit of it.
Think books aren't scary? Well, think about this: You can't spell "Book" without "Boo!
...why were you happier when you were a kid? Because you didn't know anything. The more you know, the sadder you get.
Life is chaotic and unpredictable. If a butterfly flaps its wings in one part of the world, it could cause people at the opposite end of the globe to watch a Discovery Channel special on butterflies
So my heart goes out to them. Figuratively. I would never actually entrust my heart to scientists—they'd probably implant it in a baboon. And a baboon with my heart would be practically unstoppable. Baboon strength and agility combined with my determination and media savvy? It would be a threat to all of humanity.
I am no fan of books.
In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth.” Sorry, Darwin-huggers, but it’s not “In the beginning, a monkey evolutioned gay marriage.
So, if I'm no cheerleader of sports, why write a chapter about it? Sports do have some positive impact on society. They solve problems, such as how to get inner-city kids to spend $175 on shoes. They serve as a backdrop for some of our most memorable commercials. And they remain the one and only relevant application of math. Not only that, but we have sports to thank for most of the last century's advances in manliness. The system starts in school, where gym class separates the men from the boys. Then those men are taught to be winners, or at least, losers that hate themselves.
Divorce is marital welfare.It’s just couples asking society to bail them out because they didn’t do enough research before they got married.
Science attacks our most cherished opinions. Opinions which come straight from our collective gut. Oh, wait, according to gastroenterologists, the only thing that comes from the gut is waste left from the digestion of food. That’s right, “waste.” I guess that means that scientists literally think our opinions should be flushed down the toilet!
Don’t get me wrong. Being a mom is no picnic. Raising the kids is the mother’s responsibility. It’s a thankless, solitary job, like sheriff or Pope.
Any religion whose messiah’s name isn’t recognized by Microsoft Word can’t be that much of a threat.
The worst thing about affirmative action is that it encourages reverse discrimination, so-called because it goes in the opposite way of how we naturally discriminate.
Luckily, a recent survey published in the American Sociological Review revealed that atheists are the least trusted group in America—less trusted, even, than homosexuals. It makes sense at least we trust the homosexuals with our hair.
Sorry, but retirement offends me. You don’t just stop fighting in the middle of a war because your legs hurt. So why do you get to stop working in the middle of your life just because your prostate hurts? That’s desertion.
If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, I hope it lands on a philosophy professor.
Here's an easy way to figure out if you're in a cult: If you're wondering whether you're in a cult, the answer is yes.
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That's not a religion, that's Pokemon.
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Religion forces every individual to take responsibility. Specifically, take it away from yourself and give it to God. If we had to be accountable for every one of our actions, we'd be crippled with indecision. But with religion pointing the way, we can feel confident in our choice to picket our children's elementary school when we find out the art teacher is gay.
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But here's the biggest head-scratcher of all: Not only are atheists destroying our country, they're completely deluding themselves. There's simply no way to prove that there is no God. If I didn't hate them so much, I'd feel bad for these folks. Imagine going through life completely duped into thinking that there's no invisible, omniscient higher power guiding every action on Earth. It's just so arbitrary! Can't they see?
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Baptists: I'm a pious guy, but even I have my limits. I draw the line right around spending 8 hours in church every Sunday. Church should be a solemn 45 minutes to sit quietly and feel guilty, with donuts at the end to make you feel better. I don't go in for a full day of singing and dancing and rejoicing, no matter how nice the hats are. I prefer my Gospel monotonously droned to me from a pulpit, thank you very much.
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About Stephen Colbert

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About the book

Congratulations--just by opening the cover of this book you became 25% more patriotic.

From Stephen Colbert, the host of television's highest-rated punditry show The Colbert Report, comes the book to fill the other 23½ hours of your day. I Am America (And So Can You!) contains all of the opinions that Stephen doesn't have time to shoehorn into his nightly broadcast.

Dictated directly into a microcassette recorder over a three-day weekend, this book contains Stephen's most deeply held knee-jerk beliefs on The American Family, Race, Religion, Sex, Sports, and many more topics, conveniently arranged in chapter form.

Always controversial and outspoken, Stephen addresses why Hollywood is destroying America by inches, why evolution is a fraud, and why the elderly should be harnessed to millstones.

You may not agree with everything Stephen says, but at the very least, you'll underst

Book details

First published
2007
Goodreads rating
3.90 (85k ratings)

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