Jeremy Hardy

"It seems a shallow observation, but… the Tory Conference are not an attractive lot, are they? I mean, if all those people were born in the same village, you'd blame pollution, wouldn't you?"

"It is a stupid observation, but the Labour Party are not an smart lot, are they? I mean, if all those people were born in the same town, you would blame bad parenting, wouldn't you all?"

"… really very critical of hereditary peers, but they — I mean — they've got their faults, but some of those faults have been in the family for generations."

"You can inherit male-pattern baldness from your mother's father, but not a tendency to fight in the First World War."

"I don't get this fashion for happy funerals. He said he wanted all his mates to be in a good mood and smile, and this is a very fashionable idea, that when you die, it's supposed to be a celebration and joyous and everyone laughing, but I want people's lives torn apart when I go. I want to be embalmed and brought out when we have guests."

"My daughter wanted a new pair of trainers. I told her "You're eleven, make your own!""

"Have you ever looked at Kylie's teeth? Those teeth are proportional to the teeth of a camel in the mouth of a toddler."

"If you just took everyone in the BNP and everyone who votes for them and shot them in the back of the head, there would be a brighter future for us all."

"The need to compile lists is a personality disorder, as is the need to assert the superiority of some things over other things."

"All socialists have bad backs because we slouch — except when we’re watching the news when we sit on the edge of our seats, shout, and wave our arms. Generally we sit hunched, arms crossed in a judgemental way, the whole of our bodies pulled into a frown."

"Most harm is done by people who are awake."

"Why don't they just accept that life is sad and cheer up it's not forever."

"The only way you can ever accuse a Conservative of hypocrisy is if they walk past a homeless person without kicking him in the face."

"Capitalism is a great idea in theory, but in practice it just doesn't work."

"The Afghan War has clearly reached a stage similar to that moment at your child's party where you realise you've forgotten to give the other parents a pick up time."

"People say I'm self-deprecating, but I don't think I'm very good at that."

"On Vince Cable: But he's charming and northern; he's the man tasked with crushing the poor in their own accent, isn't he really?"

"It was developing countries where people are more cheery, wasn't it? ... Well, because when people are materially disadvantaged, maybe they're more optimistic, because they know that their destiny's not entirely in their own hands. And so they just have to hope for the best. Whereas in the developed world, where materially we've got plenty of stuff, and lots of opportunities, we know that the only thing stopping us from being happy is ourselves, which of course is a kind of downward spiral into disillusionment and hopelessness, isn't it, really? Because you can't -- you're never gonna get rid of yourself, so if you're basically unhappy, you're always gonna be unhappy, and in the remaining time that you've got left, you're either gonna be in despair about the fact that you've wasted your life, or maybe a bit cheerful about the fact that it's nearly over."

"Northern Ireland is part of Ireland, not Britain, as can clearly be seen from aerial photographs."