Day: 4/9/2011

Bill O’Reilly: King Pinhead Reclaims His Crown

Posted by on April 9, 2011 at 12:03 pm. 3 Comments :

Bill O'ReillyBill O’Reilly used his weekly column this week to pump up his departing pal, Glenn Beck. Somehow I don’t think his heart was really in it because his argument was barely coherent. And why not? He does stand to regain his throne as the predominant Fox News bloviator after Beck slithers off.

O’Reilly’s chief defense of Beck is that he is just an average schmo – a harmless gadfly who loves his country. O’Reilly whines that…

The hue and cry about Beck is downright hysterical. Why do they care? Beck isn’t an elected official; he’s not even a journalist. He’s just a guy with an opinion. So what’s the beef?

Exactly! What’s the beef? Beck is just your ordinary street corner herald of Armageddon who sees communists in every Prius, thinks atheist Muslims are taking over America, and calls President Obama a racist who hates white people (I presume including his own mother). However, O’Reilly manages to contradict himself a few sentences later exhorting that we…

“Remember that he’s the guy who exposed President Barack Obama’s “green jobs czar,” Van Jones […and…] also drove a campaign against ACORN. […] Those are big accomplishments, the kinds of things that can get all sorts of powerful people upset”

So which is it? O’Reilly is appalled that anyone would complain about a nobody like Beck, then asserts that Beck has had a huge impact on major issues. O’Reilly attributes the animosity toward Beck as the left’s opposition to free speech. He condemns those who criticize Beck as intolerant ideologues:

“Many hard-core ideologues in both camps simply do not want to hear opinions other than their own. And if someone is successfully bloviating views that differ from their orthodoxy, they go ballistic.”

Exactly! And on this matter O’Reilly knows what he’s talking about because he has his own web site dedicated to going ballistic on media with whom he disagrees. This is the classic conservative complaint that grants freedom of speech to right-wingers but denies it to anyone who wants to talk back.

In the end, this is just O’Reilly’s way of patting Beck on the back as he waltzes him to the exit. And O’Reilly is getting a running start on his return to being the King Pinhead of Fox news.

Fox News Demonstrates How NOT To Make A Correction

Posted by on April 9, 2011 at 10:23 am. 1 Comments :

Faux PasOn February 24, Fox News published an article by their in-house pseudo-liberal, Juan Williams. Like any good Fox News Democrat (FND), Williams pretended to advance a liberal viewpoint while attacking what he and Fox regard as a liberal target.

That’s standard operating procedure for Fox. What makes this occurrence worse is that Williams badly mangled the facts that were the whole premise of his attack. (Actually, that’s pretty standard for Fox as well). The Williams article began by stating…

“This week The Washington Post released a stunning poll. But the news did not make its front page.” […] “The poll done by The Washington Post, the Kaiser Family Foundation and Harvard University was buried in The Post’s Sunday business section…”

As it turns out, the poll in question was actually printed front and center, section A, page 1, of the Sunday Post. Fox was alerted to this glaring error, but they ignored it for nearly six weeks. Finally they posted this correction on April 5:

EDITOR’S NOTE: The results of the poll referred to in this article were in fact reported on the front page of the Feb. 20 editions of the Washington Post. Mr. Williams regrets the oversight to the Post, and maintains the study’s findings deserved more prominent coverage in other media outlets.

Why did Fox take so long to correct the error? Could it be that they wanted to wait until the story became stale so that few would ever see the correction? And why did Williams temper his “regrets” with a defense of his conclusions that were based on his false reporting? He was inappropriately using a correction notice to pursue an argument he had already lost.

On the other hand, Fox News commits errors far worse than this on a daily basis without ever acknowledging them, so I suppose we should be grateful that Fox bothered to issue a correction at all.

Handicapping The Race For Glenn Beck’s Successor

Posted by on April 9, 2011 at 12:46 am. 3 Comments :

On April 6th Fox News and Glenn Beck announced that his program would be “transitioning” off the air. Reminds me a little of when Charlie Sheen was transitioned off of Two and a Half Men. And so, as the chalk dust settles, it is time to look ahead.


On April 1st, just a few days prior to this announcement, I rather prophetically “revealed” a list of candidates that Fox News was considering to replace Beck. It included such conservative luminaries as Ann Coulter, Andrew Breitbart, and Ted Nugent. Now I would like to offer my own musings on how Fox could fill their 5:00pm slot.

The Favorite: Judge Andrew Napolitano. He is currently the most frequent fill-in host for Beck and holds almost identical views. If anything, he leans even further off the ledge by openly asserting the 9/11 Truther position that the World Trade Center attack was an inside job.

The Gender Card: Laura Ingraham. She has the reliably wingnut views that are a prerequisite for Fox anchordom. More importantly, she fulfills Fox’s blonde quotient. She’s paid her dues filling in for Bill O’Reilly and would bring a sizable radio audience, just as her predecessor did.

The Young Turk: Eric Bolling. He currently hosts a program on Fox’s floundering business network and may be due for a transfer to the mother ship. He has filled in for Beck and appears as a guest on several Fox shows. But this guy may want it too bad. His delivery is that of someone in a permanent state of shock. On second thought, he may have shot.

The Lone Stranger: Juan Williams. Fox shelled out $2 million for Williams when he was booted out of NPR. By giving him his own show they might be able to justify that ridiculous outlay for an occasional commentator. Plus they would fill a dual demographic hole in their schedule by promoting an African-American liberal. However, that is also two strikes against any Fox News hopeful. Even though Williams is barely a liberal, the fact that he isn’t batshit insane might be enough to disqualify him alone. And since Fox’s audience is more than 98% white, the race card isn’t worth much to them.

The Dark Horse: G. Gordon Liddy. This former Watergate burglar would love to bring his radio shtick to television. He has a loyal following and would be able to retain all of Beck’s survivalist products advertisers. He would provide a consistent transition for the American Patriopaths who revere God, gold, and guns.

Of course, there are plenty of other options for Fox. They could poach Rick Santelli from CNBC. He’s the guy who got the whole Tea Party parade marching. Or they could just stretch Bret Baier’s program for an extra hour. That would be cheap and it would refocus the network on news – something which with they have little experience.

And then there’s my favorite contestant: Victoria Jackson. She has Tea Party cred and is guaranteed to never say anything that would go over the heads of the Fox viewers – or their kids.