Bill O’Reilly And John Boehner: Brotherhood Of The Traveling Pants On Fire

Posted by Mark NC on March 6, 2013 at 4:49 am. 2 Comments :

In recent days, the resounding cry from the right-wing pundits and politicians regarding sequestration has been a demonstrably false yammering that President Obama has neglected to put forth a plan to cut spending. And it’s a pretty good talking point except for the fact that there isn’t a bit of truth to it.

This plaintive squeal was heard last Sunday when John Boehner appeared on Meet the Press to peddle his party line fiction. He told host David Gregory that “even today, there’s no plan from Senate Democrats or the White House to replace the sequester.” For that mangling of the truth, Boehner earned a “Pants On Fire” designation from PolitiFact who posted a detailed debunking of Boehner’s…well, bunk. Boehner went on to blame senate Democrats for not passing a bill that only failed due to senate Republicans filibustering it.

The howling further escalated last night when Bill O’Reilly nearly had an aneurism while debating the same subject with Alan Colmes (video below). O’Reilly almost immediately began shouting red-faced at Colmes for his having correctly stated that the President does have a plan. O’Reilly viciously called his fellow Fox News employee a liar seven times in rapid succession as Colmes calmly objected and tried to settle him down. But O’Reilly could not be assuaged. Here is a partial transcript of the exchange:

O’Reilly: The President’s willing to have Americans suffer for the greater good of trying to have Nancy Pelosi be the new Speaker of the House. […] Give me one program he said he would cut.
Colmes: He would cut Medicare and Medicaid.
O’Reilly: That’s not a specific program.
Colmes: You asked me for a program – those are programs.
O’Reilly: You’re not telling me anything. It’s jack____ what you’re saying.
Colmes: There would be less money going to the states. There would be less money being reimbursed to doctors.
O’Reilly: You don’t know where. You don’t know how much. You don’t know to whom. And the reason you don’t know it is because the guy you revere refuses to say anything specific about anything.

O’Reilly’s high-pitched histrionics did nothing to make the substance of his ranting more truthful. Just as Boehner’s demurring failed to refute the factual evidence that the President’s plan does exist. It is available on the White House web site for anyone who is interested and honest – which obviously exempts Boehner and O’Reilly.

Watching trained circus clowns like O’Reilly and Boehner distort reality is bad enough, but what’s really troubling is the tendency of so much of the media to fail to set the record straight when there is no credible case to support the lies of these charlatans. And they will certainly not set the record straight themselves. O’Reilly in particular is notorious for digging in his heels even after he has been proven to be wrong. It’s a character trait common among egomaniacal sociopaths who regard themselves as infallible defenders of humanity’s virtue.

Fox News Freak-Outs: How The Big Bully Of Cable News Fizzles Under Fire

Posted by Mark NC on February 20, 2013 at 2:55 am. 3 Comments :

In the cable news business there is one network that relentlessly boasts about its prominence and formidable presence above all others. Fox News is clearly taken with itself and is even promoted in their own ads as “The Most Powerful Name In News.” That makes it all the more curious that Fox seems to shudder when confronted with opposing arguments.

This article was also published on Alternet.

Fox News is often the subject of well-deserved criticism due to their aversion to facts and a long record of strident bias. However, their first reaction to reasonable rebuttals is to go on the attack against their perceived enemies. It is behavior reminiscent of schoolyard bullies with marshmallow centers who struggle to mask their hurt feelings with forced bluster. What follows are seven examples of just how thin-skinned this allegedly powerful network really is, and how prone they are to whining when they get smacked down.

At a press conference President Obama astutely noted that the penchant Fox News has for punishing Republicans who dare to work cooperatively with Democrats has the effect of discouraging Republicans from such cooperation. That rather modest observation sent Fox News into a tizzy. Jumping immediately to the most absurd stretches of hyperbole, Steve Doocy of Fox & Friends fired up the outrage machine to accuse the President of attacking, not merely Fox News, but the First Amendment. Meanwhile the determinedly dishonest Fox Nation web site declared the President’s remarks to be a threat. How Obama was infringing on freedom of the press or threatening anyone was never explained.

In an interview Al Gore commented on Fox News and right-wing talk radio saying “The fact that we have 24/7 propaganda masquerading as news, it does have an impact.” Rather than try to dispute the obvious truth of Gore’s comment, Fox’s Peter Johnson, Jr launched into a harangue about Gore permitting a news enterprise based in the oil-producing nation of Qatar to buy his network, Current TV. Yes, that had nothing to do with Gore’s remarks, but it did serve Johnson’s purpose of blindly lashing out at Gore for daring to besmirch Fox.

Author and military foreign policy expert Tom Ricks was invited on to discuss his new book, The Generals. Fox host Jon Scott thought he could get Ricks to join Fox’s crusade to blame Obama for the tragedy in Benghazi, but Ricks wasn’t cooperating and told Scott that “I think that the emphasis on Benghazi has been extremely political, partly because Fox was operating as a wing of the Republican Party.” That was apparently too much for Scott who abruptly ended the interview less than 90 seconds after it began. After taking criticism from other media for that self-serving censorship, Fox VP Michael Clemente doubled down and disparaged Ricks for not having “the strength of character to apologize.”

Greta Van Susteren saw an opportunity to whimper about how mistreated Fox is when she complained that the State Department had left them off the mailing list for a couple of news briefings. She called it “a coordinated effort” to punish Fox by “denying Fox access to information.” What she failed to disclose was that the State Department had previously explained that they had only notified news organizations that had reporters assigned to cover the department and that, having none, Fox didn’t get on the list. But that explanation didn’t stop Van Susteren and others at Fox from assailing the administration for an imagined snubbing.

In a debate over whether or not NBC had ever criticized President Obama on the use of drones, Bill O’Reilly falsely claimed that the drone story never appeared on NBC. In fact, it was NBC who broke the story. The following night, after much ridicule for his egregious mistake, rather than apologize and set the record straight, O’Reilly lashed at the “loons” who were engaging in “more deceit from the far left.” As usual, any critical analysis of O’Reilly or Fox News is viewed as liberal Fox-bashing and is met with name-calling and vilification.

Fox’s Juan Williams is one of the network’s alleged lefties. When he made a disturbingly racist comment about his fear of flying with Muslim passengers, he was let go by his other employer NPR. The reaction from Fox News was swift and utterly repulsive. Fox’s CEO Roger Ailes lashed out in defense of his pet liberal saying of NPR that “They are, of course, Nazis. They have a kind of Nazi attitude. They are the left wing of Nazism.” Most people would regard that as something of an overreaction, but for Fox it is consistent with their characteristic vengefulness when they consider themselves under siege.

Perhaps the most frequent target of Fox’s vitriol is the watchdog group, Media Matters for America. By defining its mission as a monitor of conservative bias in the news, Media Matters has earned the undying enmity of Fox News. In the course of their persistent barrage of slander aimed at Media Matters, Fox has called the founder, David Brock, (without substantiation) a dangerous, self-loathing, mentally ill, drug user. Fox was so frightened by Media Matters that, in the week prior to publication of their book The Fox Effect, Fox News broadcast no fewer than a dozen derogatory pieces in a preemptive strike with segments on their most popular programs, including The O’Reilly Factor, Hannity, Fox & Friends, etc. It was the sort of blanket coverage they usually reserved for a natural disaster, a declaration of war, or a lewd TwitPic of a politician. Fox’s anti-Media Matters campaign even included solicitations on the air (more than 30 times) by Fox anchors beseeching their viewers to file complaints with the IRS challenging Media Matters’ tax-exempt, non-profit status.

These are just a few of the more notable instances when Fox has engaged in pronounced public wailing after taking flack from a critic. But it’s an almost daily occurrence for Fox to slap back at a politician, pundit, or even a celebrity, who utters something that Fox regards as unflattering. Just ask Bill Maher or Nas or Sean Penn. For a network that touts its powerfulness, Fox News behaves with the sort of tender sensitivity that is generally associated with sniveling weakness. They wildly lash out at critics and stubbornly refuse to acknowledge mistakes or accept responsibility when errors are pointed out. It is, to say the least, undignified, unprofessional, and immature, but it is the Fox way.

Bill O’Reilly Can’t Stop Embarrassing Himself: The Drone Edition

Posted by Mark NC on February 14, 2013 at 11:41 am. 2 Comments :

Last week Bill O’Reilly demonstrated how utterly inept he and his staff were when he asked “You heard anything on NBC about the drones?” Then he answered his own question saying “Neither have I. Neither has my staff.” As it turns out it was actually NBC who broke the story that had spurred the media dialogue on the subject.

However, O’Reilly stiffened his back and insisted that he was still right with a tortured explanation that talking about drones was not talking about drones. On last night’s program he wandered further into delusional territory during an interview with Howard Kurtz, who had previously criticized O’Reilly about his not noticing NBC’s role in the coverage of drones. O’Reilly charged Kurtz with hypocrisy and accused him of…

“…confusing hard news reporting about drones with the New York Times editorial page, which hasn’t condemned, as far as I know, in any great measure as they did with waterboarding, the use of it. What we were clearly talking about here was why the left doesn’t condemn killing terrorists with drones.”

As you might expect, O’Reilly stuck his massive foot into his even bigger mouth yet again. Nearly a year ago, well before this current dust up, the Times published an editorial titled “Too Much Power for a President.” The very first paragraph reads…

“It has been clear for years that the Obama administration believes the shadow war on terrorism gives it the power to choose targets for assassination, including Americans, without any oversight. On Tuesday, The New York Times revealed who was actually making the final decision on the biggest killings and drone strikes: President Obama himself. And that is very troubling.”

The Times goes on to say…

“No one in that position should be able to unilaterally order the killing of American citizens or foreigners located far from a battlefield — depriving Americans of their due-process rights.”

So much for the Times not condemning drones. Even worse, O’Reilly actually contradicted his own premise that liberals have not been critical of Obama’s drone policy despite their criticism of Bush’s waterboarding and torture tactics. In the opening of this segment O’Reilly explicitly acknowledged that liberals were openly opposing Obama’s CIA director nominee over this very issue.

“Will counter-terrorism advisor John Brennan become the head of the CIA? He testifies on Capitol Hill tomorrow, but some liberals don’t like him because he is the director of the drone program that kills terrorists from the sky.”

O’Reilly needs to explain how liberals can be hypocrites for not speaking out against drones when they are, in fact, speaking out and O’Reilly himself has heard it and used it to introduce his story. He may also want to explain how he missed the New York Times editorial hammering the President on drones, but still went on the air to say the Times never criticized Obama. His loathing for depraved lefties was palpable as he piled on his rage:

“This is about one thing. Hypocrisy. You leftists screaming about waterboarding yet they’re muted about killing with drones because they’re in the tank for Barack Obama.”

Right! Leftists like the New York Times, Rachel Maddow, Glenn Greenwald, etc. are all in the tank for Obama even while they harshly slam him for deploying drones. It should also be noted that another news organization actually did mute the drone story – Fox News. Therefore they must also be in the tank for Obama.

How many times does O’Reilly have to get virtually everything wrong before people will take notice that he is just blabbering old fool who can’t form a coherent argument on any subject? If he had the capacity to feel shame he might hole himself up in a cabin in Idaho for the remainder of the decade. Unfortunately, his prodigious ego will ensure that he will continue to misinform his audience and whine pitifully when someone tries to point out his mistakes. And somehow this gets ratings for Fox. Well, I guess if people will watch Honey Boo Boo, they will watch anything.

Bill O’Reilly STILL Needs To Fire His Research Staff: The Drone Edition

Posted by Mark NC on February 7, 2013 at 10:29 am. 5 Comments :

Last night Bill O’Reilly mustered up his signature pomposity in a debate with Bob Beckel over whether or not NBC had ever criticized President Obama on the use of drones or even reported on the controversy. O’Reilly was almost shaking with contempt at what he considered an outrageous example of hypocrisy. Beckel didn’t seem to care much about NBC’s reporting or pretend that he knew anything about their coverage of this story. But O’Reilly was relentless about NBC’s reporting and refused to let it go.

O’Reilly: “Remember the outcry about waterboarding? You know, everybody jumping up and down? Uh, NBC News, I thought they were going to, like, melt down over there. You heard anything on NBC about the drones? […] Neither have I. Neither has my staff.”

O’Reilly went on to accuse NBC of deliberately avoiding the story “because they are protecting the President.” There’s only one small thing wrong with O’Reilly’s bombastic condemnation of NBC: It was NBC who broke the story that made the drone controversy the lead on every news network on television. A little exclusive published by NBC’s investigative correspondent Michael Isikoff revealed the memo that outlined the administration’s rational for drone strikes targeted at American citizens.

The intensity with which O’Reilly insisted that NBC was derelict in their reporting only made his egregious mangling of the facts all the more preposterous. And by explicitly affirming his mistaken assertions with his staff, he casts doubt on their competence as well. In that regard, this isn’t the first time that O’Reilly’s staff has let him down in spectacular fashion. Back in April of 2010, O’Reilly reproached GOP senator Tom Coburn for suggesting that Fox had aired allegations that failure to get health insurance under ObamaCare would subject you to a prison term. He vigorously denied that anyone at Fox had ever said such a thing saying…

O’Reilly: “It doesn’t happen here, and we’ve researched to find out if anybody on Fox News has ever said ‘You’re going to jail if you don’t buy health insurance.’ Nobody’s ever said it. So it seems to me what you did was, you used Fox News as a whipping boy when we didn’t qualify there.”

Unfortunately for O’Reilly and his crack research team, the video record was readily available (And this pretty hilarious stuff. The “jail” assertion was even made on O’Reilly’s program by Glenn Beck):

Fox News has been blathering for much of this week about what they delusionally call the “liberal” media for ignoring the drone story. One of the more prominent critics is the fake Fox version of a Democrat, Kirsten Powers. She has taken to the Fox airwaves to lambaste liberals and Democrats for not challenging the administration on their drone policy. However, no one has been more critical of the President on this than Isikoff, the reporter who broke the story, and Rachel Maddow, who devoted extensive portions of her show to it.

If anyone is guilty of hypocrisy it’s the Fox/GOP crowd who only seem to care about human rights when a Democratic president is accused of violating them. Both Fox and the Republican Party fiercely defended George Bush’s use of torture and wiretapping. Democrats opposed those breaches of human rights, and they are consistent today in opposing the use of drones and the targeting of Americans without due process. But these facts escape dullards like O’Reilly whose only purpose is to bash his adversaries and the facts be damned. However, if there is one thing that O’Reilly is consistent about, it’s his indifference to journalistic ethics or standards.

I couldn’t agree more, Bill-O.

[Update] O’Reilly addressed the response to his deliberately deceitful characterization of NBC’s reporting the following night. As might have been expected, he lied through his teeth absolving himself of any responsibility. His argument was simply that “I didn’t say NBC broke the memo story because we weren’t talking about that.” Not true. For the record, let’s review what he was talking about: “You heard anything on NBC about the drones? […] Neither have I. Neither has my staff.” Either he and his staff weren’t listening very closely or they don’t regard talking about drones to be talking about drones.

Fox News Ravaged By Free Market As Viewers Flee, Primetime Ratings Dive To Pre-9/11 Lows

Posted by Mark NC on January 30, 2013 at 4:10 am. 17 Comments :

Continuing a downward spiral that began last September during the Democratic National Convention, Fox News primetime ratings, in the key 25-54 year old demographic, have declined to numbers they haven’t seen since August of 2001. These are numbers that revert Fox back to the George Bush, pre-9/11 era when Fox was struggling for attention.

9/11 was an integral part of the rise of Fox News. It was the catalyst that formed their America-first persona and thrust them into a role as cheerleaders rather than journalists.

These twelve year lows for their best known programs portend trouble for Fox as their audience tires of a schedule that hasn’t changed in more than a decade. Creaky old timers O’Reilly and Hannity have been in their time slots since the network launched in 1996. Worse yet for Fox, their slump is occurring at a time when MSNBC is soaring. For most of the time since last November’s election, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O’Donnell have been beating Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity in the demo. In addition to those victories, most of MSNBC’s programs are the top performers among 18-34 year olds, which means that they have a significant advantage with the next generation of television news consumers. MSNBC is also number one with African-American viewers, a status they have enjoyed for 36 consecutive months.

The graying Fox News is a phenomenon that is occurring with both their programs and their audience. While many of Fox’s shows held steady in total audience, they plunged in the younger demos. This was true across the board with primetime and all other dayparts, including their three hour morning block, Fox & Friends. Conversely, MSNBC’s audience was up in both the demo and total audience. The ratings story for MSNBC is no longer merely one of faster growth and higher percentage gains. They are now beating their Fox competition head-on in primetime and challenging them respectably in daytime.

For the most part it appears that MSNBC’s gains are coming from new, younger viewers. They certainly are not luring dissatisfied Fox viewers over to their channel. However, Fox now has to worry about a rebuilding CNN. Their new president Jeff Zucker is shaking up the roster with announcements of hirings and firings both in front of and behind the camera. Considering that the previous management at CNN was so inept and oblivious to the news marketplace, it is hard to believe that Zucker won’t produce some improvement. And with Fox viewers abandoning the network that has been lying to them so brazenly, CNN may start to look like a plausible alternative.

Of course, as the ratings race heats up, Fox may decide to stop standing around watching their lead disappear. They will need to take bold steps to keep up with the competition. While O’Reilly is still pulling in decent numbers, Hannity is ratings loser and an embarrassment in terms of credibility. He has to be the first to go. Greta Van Susteren’s claim to fame was as an O.J. Simpson groupie who has never risen out of the tabloid mold in which she was formed. Now that her best pal and frequent guest (55 times), Sarah Palin, has been dumped by Fox, Van Susteren would be wise to update her resume. The most likely candidate to fill one of those vacancies would be Megyn Kelly, who has emerged as Fox’s most stridently biased anchor in the daytime.

There are those at Fox who know that a big part of the explanation for their decline is that the audience at large is no longer interested in the vitriolic smear jobs that Fox has specialized in for most of the past decade. They just watched President Obama get reelected, along with Democratic gains in both houses of Congress, despite their fierce determination to kneecap the Democrats and prop up the flailing GOP. They did the best they could to install a Republican regime with a coordinated campaign of propaganda and hate speech, but they failed miserably even in races they were expected to win. So they are aware that the public has rejected their best arguments and lies.

The trick will be to moderate their political biases in order to appeal to a broader audience without causing their loyalist legions to pull up stakes and camp out on Alex Jones’ web site plotting a restoration of the Confederacy from their bunkers. Spurned conservative extremists of the sort that form the foundation of the Fox audience are a vengeful lot. They primary long-serving GOP incumbents and replace them with crackpots who have no chance of winning. And that’s the sort of reaction they would have to any attempt by Fox to become less wingnutty. The Fox regulars would not only stop watching a more moderate Fox, they would turn against it with the force of a swarm of rabid squirrels deranged by disease and paranoia.

That leaves Fox in the impossible position of having to cater to their faithful fringe while reaching out to more rational viewers. It simply can’t be done and they would displease both. The only sensible course for Fox would be to accept a few seasons in the cellar as they regroup with a focus on responsible journalism. But that isn’t the style of the hardcore rightists in the Fox executive suites. Neither Rupert Murdoch nor Roger Ailes would be inclined to surrender the platform they built for wealthy elitists, captains of industry, Christian evangelists, and other power mad egomaniacs who are convinced that God has selected them to rule.

The good news is that their self-centered intransigence will insure that Fox continues to slide into obscurity and the people will have a better opportunity shape a more equitable society. Of course, the people would still have to overcome the rest of the media-corporate-government complex that has long been the biggest obstacle to a truly democratic nation. But it’s a start.

Fox News: The Whiniest ‘News’ Network Ever

Posted by Mark NC on January 29, 2013 at 11:56 am. 2 Comments :

Earlier this week President Obama correctly noted that the penchant Fox News has for punishing Republicans who dare to work cooperatively with Democrats has the effect of discouraging Republicans from such cooperation. That rather modest observation has sent Fox News into a tizzy that all but validates the President’s point. They are simply incapable of processing anything this president says in a rational manner. In this case, all he said was this:

“One of the biggest factors is going to be how the media shapes debates. If a Republican member of Congress is not punished on Fox News or by Rush Limbaugh for working with a Democrat on a bill of common interest, then you’ll see more of them doing it.”

That fired up the outrage machine at Fox. Fox Nation declared it to be a threat. Steve Doocy cast it as an attack on the First Amendment. Of course, any reasonable reading of it would find nothing approaching either of those wild overreactions. A threats implies consequences which were never articulated by the President. Nor was the First Amendment infringed upon because the free speech rights of Fox were never in any danger.

Doocy also lamented that Obama has some “scared Republicans in his camp.” By characterizing Republicans who have found some common ground with the President as “scared,” Doocy has also validated the President’s point that Fox punishes such agreement. In Fox’s world compromising with Democrats to move the country forward is evidence of cowardice. That sort of derision is exactly what Obama was referring to.

And it gets worse. Fox’s Peter Johnson, Jr. visited his kiddie pals at Fox & Friends to say that the First Amendment is now “seriously in doubt.” He interpreted Obama’s remarks to mean that the President regards anyone who disagrees with him as “an enemy of the state.” Where does he get this stuff? Johnson was so apoplectic about Obama expressing his opinion (which is also permitted by the First Amendment) that he wedded Fox News to the very concept of freedom saying “Without a free Fox, there is not a free America” Apparently, therefore, there was not a free America prior to 1996; there was not a free America during the entire Reagan Administration.

On the Fox News web site, fake Democrat Kirsten Powers wrote a scathing editorial bashing Obama as waging a war of terror on Fox News. She complained that “President Obama was back to his grousing about the one television news outlet in America that won’t fall in line and treat him as emperor.” Powers has gulped down massive quantities of the Fox Kool-Aid. But she is representative of the so-called Democrats that appear on Fox only to criticize other Democrats. The Fox version of fairness and balance is when Republicans and Democrats hate Democrats equally.

Ironically, the claim that the President makes about Republicans being vulnerable to Fox’s criticisms is one that Fox makes about itself. They consider themselves the last stand against the socialism they imagine is emanating from the White House. As Johnson said, they regard themselves as “the bulwark of our democracy.” Fox’s CEO Roger Ailes once assured Glenn Beck that he would have a free hand because “I see this as the Alamo. If I just had somebody who was willing to sit on the other side of the camera until the last shot is fired, we’d be fine.”

Fox freely admits that their intent is have an impact on government. They actually boast about the influence they have over representatives in Washington. Then, when the President notes that that is occurring, they explode with indignation over his alleged assault on freedom. It’s a cognitive disconnect that could span the Grand Canyon.

Most of all, it is whining of the highest order. No network bitches more about how they are perceived than Fox News. They spend innumerable hours complaining about their treatment by politicians, other pundits, and the whole of what they call the “mainstream media.” Sean Hannity has devoted whole programs to it. Fox & Friends denounces every media analyst as corrupt or even crazy. Bill O’Reilly has made the destruction of these scoundrels his life’s ambition, saying…

“[T]here is a huge problem in this country and I’m going to attack that problem. I’m going to attack it. These people aren’t getting away with this. I’m going to go right where they live. Every corrupt media person in this country is on notice, right now. I’m coming after you…I’m going to hunt you down […] if I could strangle these people and not go to hell and get executed…I would.”

Setting aside O’Reilly’s insane vigilantism, the thing that Fox fails to understand is that the First Amendment applies to everyone, including the President. Fox seems to think that free speech is a one-way street and that if they express their brazenly biased views, anyone who who disagrees with them is trampling on their Constitutional rights. It’s a perspective that reeks of the censorship they pretend to be disturbed by.

Bill O’Reilly’s Rules Of Civility: From The Magistrate Of Pinheads And Loons

Posted by Mark NC on December 11, 2012 at 12:08 pm. 7 Comments :

Last night on the O’Reilly Factor, Bill O’Reilly delivered his nightly Talking Points Memo on a subject with which he has profound familiarity: Incivility.

The pretext for this sermon on manners was an article by Fox Sports columnist Jason Whitlock. Whitlock was the author of the column that Bob Costas referenced in his now famous remarks about guns in American culture. So O’Reilly invited Whitlock to come on his show and Whitlock rather colorfully declined:

“I don’t have to shuffle off to the big house when summoned. O’Reilly is not Boehner, Pelosi or Obama. He’s a TV entertainer who has spent the weeks after the election crying about the end of the ‘white establishment’ America, the end of the days when an upstanding white man felt entitled to summon whomever he wanted whenever he wanted to the big house to dance. I don’t dance.”

As usual, O’Reilly didn’t take that well. He is well known for his arrogant self-righteousness and his egomaniacal worldview. Anyone with the temerity to challenge him had better steady themselves for battle. O’Reilly devoted his Talking Points to Whitlock, however he framed his retort in the broader context of what he thinks is a new rejection of civil discourse:

“We are living in a country that is rapidly changing. Rules of civility are pretty much finished. […] There are elements on both the left and the right that are using disgraceful tactics to demean those with whom they disagree.”

O’Reilly then went on to cite two examples, however, both were of liberals allegedly denigrating conservatives. So much for balance. In the first example O’Reilly bashed proponents of marriage equality for referring to “traditional marriage” advocates as homophobes and “haters.” Then O’Reilly called those who favor marriage and love for everyone “haters.” His second example dismissed any suggestion that there are Obama opponents who might be driven by racism, and anyone who implies such a thing is disgraceful.

The irony of O’Reilly criticizing others for incivility is astonishing. No one has contributed more to the advance of incivility than O’Reilly himself. He is the host of a regular segment that labels people with whom he disagrees “Pinheads.” And he frequently disparages his opponents as “loons.”

Even more damning is the fact that a study by researchers at Indiana University documents the intimidation and propagandizing employed by Fox News’ resident bully. The study, sub-titled, “Revisiting World War Propaganda Techniques,” paints an academically verified picture of O’Reilly’s repulsive modus operandi. Contrary to O’Reilly’s assertion that he doesn’t “do personal attacks,” the IU study spells out the truth:

“The IU researchers found that O’Reilly called a person or a group a derogatory name once every 6.8 seconds, on average, or nearly nine times every minute during the editorials that open his program each night.”

The IU study itemized seven propaganda devices as defined by the Institute for Propaganda Analysis. O’Reilly was found to have employed six of them nearly 13 times each minute:

Name calling – giving something a bad label to make the audience reject it without examining the evidence.
Glittering generalities – the opposite of name calling.
Card stacking – the selective use of facts and half-truths.
Bandwagon – appeals to the desire, common to most of us, to follow the crowd.
Plain folks – an attempt to convince an audience that they, and their ideas, are “of the people”.
Transfer – carries over the authority, sanction and prestige of something we respect or dispute to something the speaker would want us to accept.
Testimonials – involving a respected (or disrespected) person endorsing or rejecting an idea or person.

Sound familiar? That’s pretty much a script for every episode of The Factor. O’Reilly is an insult machine who castigates ideological adversaries and interrupts guests even while he bellows about how he thinks the left is “abusing freedom of speech.” Yet he still has the gall to lecture others on the dying of civility in America. It’s that kind of self-delusion that typifies right-wing blowhards like O’Reilly. They simply can’t see their own gaping flaws that lurk behind the towering prejudices they erect to their perceived enemies.

[Update:] On tonight’s program O’Reilly had something to say about being civil to racists:

If you can believe it, O’Reilly is more concerned about the “violence” of labeling than the violence of bigotry.

Bill O’Reilly Says That “Christianity Is Not A Religion”

Posted by Mark NC on November 29, 2012 at 3:35 pm. 12 Comments :

The War on Christmas is in full swing, folks. And the latest battle occurred last night on The O’Reilly Factor.

O’Reilly brought on David Silverman, President of American Atheists, to set up a manufactured debate over the place of Christmas in society, particularly when sponsored by agencies of the government. In the heated exchange, O’Reilly frequently bellowed at his guest whom he called a “fascist” at one point. But the segment’s most surreal moment came when O’Reilly sought to make the argument that public displays of faith on government property are permissible because…

Yikes! That’s a rather astonishing declaration. I wonder if Christians know that what they are practicing is philosophical, not religious. Among the repercussions of this revelation is that Christianity would not be protected by the First Amendment which prohibits Congress from “respecting the establishment of religion.” The Constitution says nothing about philosophies.

Just to be clear, Here is the definition of each from the Merriam-Webster Dictionary

re·li·gion noun \ri-?li-j?n\
(1) : the service and worship of God or the supernatural (2) : commitment or devotion to religious faith or observance.

phi·los·o·phy noun \f?-?lä-s(?-)f?\
(1) : all learning exclusive of technical precepts and practical arts (2) : the sciences and liberal arts exclusive of medicine, law, and theology.

It seems to me that Christianity fits squarely in the definition of religion with its worship of God and devotion to faith. Philosophy, on the other hand, explicitly excludes Christianity as a theology.

O’Reilly has said some idiotic things on this subject. Like when he wrote in his auto-bloviography “Next time you meet an atheist, tell him or her that you know [me]. Then ask him or her if they still don’t believe there’s a God.” But this makes no sense at all. It is an insult to his audience who are not likely to be pleased that their religion has been downgraded. They will surely chafe at their savior being lumped in with the likes of Aristotle, Confucius, Nietzsche, and Sartre, none of whom walked on water or rose from the dead (that we know of). And if supporting the Constitution’s principles of equality and free expression make you fascist, then there are tens of millions of American fascists. Don’t anybody tell O’Reilly or he’ll start a war on the Constitution.

[Update] Bill O’Reilly has doubled down on his insistence that Christianity is not a religion. In fact, he said that the people who think it is are “so stupid it’s painful.” But if you’re looking for stupidity, it’s in O’Reilly’s argument that Christianity cannot be a religion because “there are many different churches that promote the Christian philosophy in many different ways.” Right Bill, and all of them are “churches.” O’Reilly also quoted from a letter by Calvin Coolidge that he said proved that Christianity was merely a “state of mind,” despite the letter saying that “there will be born in us a Savior…” Now that’s not religious at all, is it?

Bill O’Reilly Inadvertently Tells The Truth About Fox News Promoting Ideology

Posted by Mark NC on November 14, 2012 at 8:55 pm. 11 Comments :

Last night Bill O’Reilly engaged in a particularly obtuse and angst-ridden defense of himself. His pique was inflamed by critics who brought attention to the commentary he gave on election night when he slammed voters who “want stuff” and seemed nostalgic for a majority white, “traditional America.”

O’Reilly: “The white establishment is now the minority. And the voters, many of them, feel that the economic system is stacked against them and they want stuff. You are going to see a tremendous Hispanic vote for President Obama. Overwhelming black vote for President Obama. And women will probably break President Obama’s way. People feel that they are entitled to things and which candidate, between the two, is going to give them things? The demographics are changing. It’s not a traditional America anymore.”

That’s fairly typical for an O’Reilly rant and isn’t newsworthy in and of itself. what’s interesting is that he had the gall to wrap this screed in an attack on left-wing critics who merely reported what he said. This led to him saying even more things for which he surely will be remembered. For instance:

O’Reilly: “There are entire media operations that exist solely to promote ideology.”

Indeed there are. And O’Reilly should know. He is the kingpin host for just such an operation. Fox News was built from scratch to promote the ideology of a lizardly old Australian and is run by the former media guru to Richard Nixon and the Republican Party. There was never any intent for Fox to be anything other than a conservative propaganda machine. So this makes O’Reilly’s remarks drip with irony. And it isn’t the first time he has obliviously wandered off the reservation. A few years ago he was candid enough to make this observation:

O’Reilly: “There are few journalistic standards left these days, as we’ve proven on this broadcast again and again.”

Yes, bill, you have certainly proven that many times over. I can’t think of another program that proves it more conclusively.

O’Reilly’s homage to a bygone era of a “traditional” nation that was predominately white and never asked for handouts is remarkably similar to Mitt Romney’s vision of an America where 47% of the people are moochers who won’t take responsibility for themselves. Romney even reiterated that thought post-election when explaining to his fleeced donors that he lost because “the President’s campaign focused on giving targeted groups a big gift.” To Romney, the race was determined by loafers whose votes could be bought by promises of federal swag – inconsequential things like health care and food. It’s funny that Romney neglected to note that his own campaign also promised big gifts to targeted voters, except the voters he targeted were wealthy folks who yearned for lower taxes and federal subsidies.

I suppose we should be grateful that O’Reilly has come forward to admit the existence of ideological media enterprises. If only he knew what he was actually talking about and recognized his own complicity for slinging the most biased hunks of pseudo-journalistic gruel ever broadcast.

FLASHBACK: Fox News Is Killing The Republican Party

Posted by Mark NC on November 10, 2012 at 3:15 pm. 5 Comments :

With the 2012 presidential election behind us, there has been a flurry of post-election analysis by observers from all across the political spectrum. One theme that I have seen coming from both the left and right is the notion that Fox News has not been particularly helpful to the Republican Party, despite that being their primary mission. This criticism reminded me of an article I published three years ago titled “Fox News Is Killing The Republican Party.” So I went back and read it, and to my surprise, it seems just as relevant to today’s political landscape as it did then. In fact, it’s rather frightening (and disappointing) that so little has changed. That is, unless your a Democrat, because the harm that Fox is causing to the GOP is a gift to the Democrats.

So on this lazy Saturday afternoon I thought I would reprise this article for your enjoyment. I reprint it here without a single modification.

[Purchase FreakShow stickers at Crass Commerce]

The case was made long ago that Fox News is a blight on the media map. It is bad for journalism. It is bad for Democracy. It is bad for America. A so-called “news” network that repeatedly misinforms, even deliberately disinforms, its audience is failing any test of public service embodied by an ethical press.

I, personally, have made the case for an embargo of Fox News by Democrats and progressives (see Starve the Beast: Part I, Part II, Part III), documenting via studied analysis that there is no affirmative value to appearing on Fox News – a network that has established itself as overtly hostile to the Democratic message and its messengers.

However, there is another side to this that has not been addressed previously. Republicans might be well advised to avoid Fox News as well. There is a case to be made that Fox News is demonstrably harmful to the Republican Party. In fact, it may be the worst thing to happen to Republicans in decades. That may seem counter-intuitive when discussing Fox News, the acknowledged public relations division of the Republican Party. Fox has populated its air with right-wing mouthpieces and brazenly partisan advocates for a conservative Republican agenda. They read GOP press releases on the air verbatim as if they were the product of original research. They provide a forum where Republican politicians and pundits can peddle their views unchallenged. So how is this harmful to Republicans?

If all we were witnessing was the emergence of a mainstream conservative network that aspired to advance Republican themes and policies, there would not be much of note here. Most of the conventional media was already center-right before there was a Fox News. But Fox has corralled a stable of the most disreputable, unqualified, extremist, lunatics ever assembled, and is presenting them as experts, analysts, and leaders. These third-rate icons of idiocy are marketed by Fox like any other gag gift (i.e. pet rocks, plastic vomit, Sarah Palin, etc.). So while most Americans have never heard of actual Republican party bosses like House Minority Leader John Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, posers like Joe the Plumber and Carrie Prejean have become household names.

Fox News has descended into depths heretofore reserved for fringe characters. They are openly promoting the wackos who believe that President Obama is ineligible to hold office because he isn’t a U.S. citizen. They feature commentaries by secessionists and even those calling for an overthrow of the government and the Constitution. This explains how folks like Ralph Peters, a retired military officer who said that the Taliban captors of a U.S. Soldier would be saving us a lot of trouble and expense if they would just kill him, earn airtime on Fox. Peters previously told Fox News that he favors military strikes against media targets. This explains how Glenn Beck can agree with a guest that it would be a good thing if America were attacked again by Osama bin Laden. And don’t even get me started on Victoria Jackson, who has joined an ever-lengthening line of psycho-Chicken Littles who compare the President to Hitler.

Good Advice:
“If crazy ideologues have infiltrated the news business, we need to know about it.”
~ Bill O’Reilly, 7/16/09

The list of loonies extends to politicians like Michele Bachmann, entertainers like Ted Nugent, and of course, the talk show pundits like Rush Limbaugh, whose maniacal rantings are elevated by Fox into their version of political dialogue. It’s a dialogue that is consumed with ACORN conspiracies and Manchurian presidents. The problem is that by elevating bona fide nutcases, they are debasing honest and informed discourse. The mental cases are crowding out any reasonable voices that might exist amongst the more moderate Republicans (if there are any left). Fox appears to have made a tactical decision to permit the inmates full run of the asylum.

As a result, the Fox News audience is being dumbed down by a parade of paranoid know-nothings. This strategy appears to be successful for Fox in that it has attracted a loyal viewership that is eager to have their twisted preconceptions affirmed. The conflict-infused fare in which Fox specializes is a ratings juggernaut – just like any good fiction. However, this perceived popularity is having an inordinate impact on the GOP platform. By doubling down on crazy, Fox is driving the center of the Republican Party further down the rabid hole. They are reshaping the party into a more radicalized community of conspiracy nuts. So even as this helps Rupert Murdoch’s bottom line, it is making celebrities of political bottom-feeders. That can’t be good for the long-term prospects of the Republican Party.

With the Fox network unabashedly promoting the most ridiculous rumors, myths, and nightmares of the rightist fringe, moderate and independent Americans will grow ever more suspicious of the Fox/GOP agenda. Most Americans do not believe that Sonia Sotomayor is a racist; or that FEMA is constructing concentration camps; or that we are on a march toward socialism, communism, fascism, or whatever the right is peddling this week. Most Americans do not believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim, a reptilian alien, or the anti-Christ. In short, most Americans think that the loopy yarns spun by Fox News are fables told by madmen – and believed by even madder men and women who wallow in their doomsday utopia.

Fox News is fond of boasting about their ratings dominance. It is a daily occurrence and the structural core of their argument that they reflect the mood of America. The GOP has bought this argument in its entirety. So it is important to note here that success in the Nielsen ratings has no correlation to public opinion polling. The ratings only measure the program choices of Nielsen’s survey participants. That is a subset of the population at large, and not a particularly representative one. It is a sample focused on consumers, not voters. And its respondents are just those willing to have their TV viewing monitored 24 hours a day, which skews the sample in favor of people who aren’t creeped out by that. What’s more, viewing choices are not necessarily an endorsement of the opinions presented in the program. There are many reasons people choose to watch TV shows, the most frequent being its entertainment value. So any attempt to tie ratings to partisan politics is a foolish exercise that demonstrates a grievous misunderstanding of the business of television.

As for what constitutes success in the television marketplace, due to the broad diversification of available programming, it doesn’t take much to be heralded as a hit. A mere 3 share (3% of people watching TV) will land you in the top 10. For cable news the bar is set even lower. In fact, the top rated show on the top rated cable news network (The O’Reilly Factor) only gets about 3 million viewers. That’s less than 1% of the American population. It’s also less than World Wrestling Entertainment, SpongeBob SquarePants, and the CBS Evening News (the lowest rated broadcast network news program). By contrast, America’s Got Talent is seen by 12 million viewers – four times O’Reilly’s audience.

Numbers this low ought not to inspire much excitement from political operatives. Nevertheless, Republicans are riding the coattails of Fox News as if it were representative of a booming conservative mandate in the electorate. They are embracing Fox’s most delusional eccentrics. This is leading to the promotion of similar eccentrics within the party. Which brings us the absurd spectacle of the network’s nuts interviewing the party’s pinheads.

The inevitable result of this system of rewarding those farthest from reality is the creation of a constituency of crackpots. It is an endorsement of the philosophy brewed by the Tea Baggers that espouses racism, tyranny, and armed revolt. It is enabling a frightening corps of openly militant adversaries of democracy, free speech, and Constitutional rule. It is the sort of environment that produced the murders of Dr. George Tiller and Holocaust Museum guard Stephen Johns.

This is a textbook example of how the extreme rises to the top. It is also fundamentally contrary to the interests of the Republican Party. The more the population at large associates Republican ideology with the agenda of Fox News, and the fringe operators residing there, the more the party will be perceived as out of touch, or even out of their minds. It seems like such a waste after all of the effort and expense that Fox put into building a pseudo-journalistic enterprise with the goal of confounding viewers with false news-like theatrics.

Make no mistake, Fox News is still managed by hard core party patrons. And I’m not referring just to opinion-driven commentators like Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, and Sean Hannity, although they are bad enough. No, I am talking about executives and editors like CEO, Roger Ailes, former Nixon and Bush media consultant. I’m talking about Washington Managing Editor and VP, Bill Sammon, an avid right-wing alum of the Washington “Moonie” Times. I’m talking about Business News Chief and VP, Neil Cavuto, antagonistic interrupter extraordinaire. And let us not forget the head hype-master, Rupert Murdoch, whose UK operations were just discovered to have been unlawfully wiretapping celebrities, politicians, and even members of the Royal Family. Augmenting that executive roster are the GOP regulars who are straight out of the just retired Republican White House: Karl Rove, Dana Perino, John Bolton, Dan Senor, and Linda Chavez. And then there are the Fox News clowns…er…“contributors” like Dick Morris, Ann Coulter, Fred Barnes, Charles Krauthammer, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich, Bernie Goldberg, Michele Malkin, and on and on. If nothing else, Fox is a full-employment program for rightist weasels (and they also operate the Conservative Book Promotion Club).

The mission of Fox News from its inception was to be more than just a voice of opposition to Democrats. It was to utterly crush the left end of the political spectrum leaving only a teetering right wing with no counter balance. Yet, despite the torrid embrace between Republicans and Fox News, it is apparent that Fox is the source of a sort of friendly fire that is decimating the GOP by exalting its most outlandish and unpopular players. And since Republicans have not been particularly popular anyway lately, the anchor being thrown to them by Fox can’t be all that helpful – – – Except to Democrats.

The more things change, the more they get even crazier than they were before.

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