Bill O’Reilly, Wrong Again: On Conservative Invitations To The MLK Event

Modern conservatives are obsessed with demonstrating their admiration for Martin Luther, Jr. now that he has been dead for 45 years and is universally regarded as a civil rights icon. While he was alive they despised him as a rabble-rousing commie and opposed his efforts to integrate schools, workplaces, and other social institutions.

Today they scramble to get invitations to an event commemorating King’s best remembered speech as if they were teenage girls trying to get into a Justin Beiber concert. Never mind that they continue to work furiously against the principles for which King fought, and they endeavor to roll back the clock on everything from voting rights to job opportunities.

Bill O'Reilly

On his program today, Bill O’Reilly joined the rush to pretend that King is a revered figure amongst those on the right. In a dialogue with James Carville, O’Reilly made what he must have thought was a profound observation: “Wasn’t it a little strange that they didn’t have one black conservative or one black Republican? Did their invitations get lost in the mail, or what?”

Carville began his response by noting the appearances by former presidents Carter and Clinton, but was interrupted by O’Reilly snidely remarking that “Isn’t George W. Bush a former president.” Carville replied that he didn’t know whether Bush was invited or not, to which O’Reilly matter-of-factly stated “He wasn’t. No Republicans and no conservatives were invited.”

Not surprisingly, given O’Reilly’s track record for accuracy and honesty, none of that was true. Bush was invited but declined because he is still recuperating from heart surgery. And even Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal reported that the claim that all conservatives were deliberately excluded was false. In fact, GOP House Speaker John Boehner was invited. The GOP majority leader of the House, Eric Cantor, was invited. Both declined. Former NAACP president Julian Bond appeared on MSNBC lamenting that organizers invited “a long roster of Republicans who all said no. They did, however, attend their own Republican-sponsored affair.

If this is evidence of the GOP’s re-dedication to expanding their base and reaching out to minority constituents, they are going to be sorely disappointed come election time. Conservatives didn’t like King fifty years ago, they don’t like his message today, and they snubbed efforts to participate in the tribute. No wonder they need O’Reilly to misrepresent the facts and invent a non-existent controversy, falsely blaming unnamed liberals for excluding them. I wonder what excuses these losers made up for not having been invited to their proms.

O’Reilly is famous for failing to take responsibility for his mistakes and untruths. He never admitted he was wrong when he said there weren’t any homeless veterans. He never “apologized for being an idiot,” as he promised, if ObamaCare was upheld by the Supreme Court. And you can safely expect that he will not take responsibility for these egregiously dishonest remarks either. [Credit where credit’s due: On his program tonight O’Reilly did acknowledge that he was wrong about conservatives not being invited to the MLK event. I guess there’s a first time for everything.]

[Update:] Right-wingers throughout the media have been blasting the MLK event for not inviting conservatives. However, numerous conservatives were invited, but turned it down. Amongst those was Tim Scott, the only current African-American senator (albeit an appointed one), who many pundits held up as an example of the bias shown by the event’s organizers. As it turns out, Scott was also invited and he, too, declined.

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14 thoughts on “Bill O’Reilly, Wrong Again: On Conservative Invitations To The MLK Event

  1. B ut if Billy admits they were invited and declined, then he is forced to admit that GOP racism is alive and thriving. Can’t have that, now, can we?

  2. Must be nice not having a brain, eh, Bill-O?

  3. They had no plans to be there, their base would have gone bonkers and the repub politicians know it.

  4. Isn’t it ironic that, in a story about accuracy, you misspell the name of the majority leader of the House? It’s ‘Cantor’, not ‘Canter’.

    Have some professionalism.

  5. “Today they scramble to get invitations to an event commemorating King’s best remembered speech as if they were teenage girls trying to get into a Justin Beiber concert. Never mind that they continue to work furiously against the principles for which King fought, and they endeavor to roll back the clock on everything from voting rights to job opportunities.”
    Mark, so many times you are so full of shit it’s impossible to ignore – conservatives don’t “work furiously against the principles for which King fought” Conservatives have a different approach than progressives – a non-government activist approach, which means no groups gets “special treatment over another”. I know progressives only believe minorities can get ahead ONLY with government help – which is so incredibly patronizing to all minorities. Progressives just push a different form of discrimination to “help” these groups. In doing it, you divide the people even more. I would argue progressive policy is more detrimental to the well being of minorities than any actual conservative policy (which is different than current GOP policy), which essentially takes the approach that all men are created equal and no one should get special privilege. You can continue to try to make people like Bill O’Reilly the official spokeman for conservatives in your desire to divide the people of this country, but people with any common sense know it’s not true.

    • Steve in York – you always show you don’t understand things.

      Progressives don’t think that minorities can “only” get ahead with government help, and a lot of actions that progressives advocate for have nothing to do with government. For example, affirmative action is not something that only exists at a government level. Many affirmative action organizations have to do withe people understanding their biases when they begin a hiring process. I work in higher education, in a *private*university. All of our hiring processes ask us to take into consideration ways to expand the pool of candidates. Often, when people hire, they think: “Oh, Bob is retiring. We have to replace Bob.” Then, they go looking for someone like Bob. There is sociological research that show this. We go through training to say, “Bob is retiring. What qualifications do we need to hire a replacement.” We also look for venues to find people who are underrepresented in our faculty – and it’s not just the color of skin.

      None of this guarantees that the new hire will be African-American, latino, a woman, handicapped, whatever. It means that we learn to look at people objectively and not just “replace Bob” – a white male.

      I don’t think your concern trolling is very helpful to mend any divides, by the way. What I have learned from listening to right-wingers is that they think that other people’s problems don’t exist, and they’ve got theirs so bugger off. (This includes my mother, btw, who is very generous with family but who thinks anyone can do what she does, so why is there a discussion about anything? And my neighbor who lectured my husband and me one long, horrid evening about how horrible we were as people for being liberal at all. And my father-in-law who thinks that the headlines on Fox news tell the whole story and that the US is about to crumble into a mass of anarchy.)

      • Well, I appreciate your response, but I too work in higher ed and there is an incredibly clear bias toward minorities and women, maybe that isn’t the norm, but it is here. Even your example supports my view – you focus (and i assume you are trained as such) on the white male part – if you focus on the job requirements and interviewing the BESTAlso – I get from previous posts you’ve written that you disagree with my general assessment of progressivism – maybe it’s just me or maybe you’re being a bit naive as to the realities of those programs you think are so beneficial. Affirmative action – as you brought up – doesn’t even resemble President Johnson’s exec order in its application – and that was a federal issue.

      • As you’ve been so good as to explain your view of progressivism in this post and in previous ones, i would like to address one line you included that should be cleared up “What I have learned from listening to right-wingers is that they think that other people’s problems don’t exist, and they’ve got theirs so bugger off.”
        that of course is total nonsense – as you may feel about my opinions on progressives. We all know other peoples problems exist – but is it at all the governments job to fix them – NO in my conservative opinion. I don’t think with my heart – only my brain. There is no RIGHT to a living wage, affordable housing, healthcare, etc. A person earns those things through hard work and good decision making. Now if you want to talk about those who, by no fault of their own, have issues – I’m good with having support for them, but only those who actually got a raw deal or who are true victims, not those who fabricate victimhood.

  6. I messed up the response – after BEST should insert “appicants, race and/or gender should be a non-issue. If you want the best, you get the best regardless of race, that is complete nonsense. if it’s a white guy – so be it. But I’ve seen a lot of searches failed due to lack of minority participation – what a bunch of idiocy. Of course, as a registered engineer, I find minorities are seriously under represented – you could never fill a position if that is a requirement.”

  7. “There’s a first time for everything…”

    O’Reilly also fully admitted he was wrong and apologized with regards to the Shirley Sherrod incident. So you have been caught once again with another false statement, Mark.

    • O’Reilly did apologize for Shirley Sherrod? A real one, not just a kneejerk reaction? Seems out of character…

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