Double Take

This may come as a surprise to a lot of people, but I like Bill O’Reilly. Well, I used to. Until about three hours ago.

I know, I know, Bill O’Reilly is the devil. He’s loud, he’s abrasive, he’s brash, he’s larger than life. He often speaks without thinking, substantiates arguments with dubious facts, cuts people off in conversation and intimidates people by sending camera crews to their homes and accosting them on their front porches to ask them questions they obviously have no desire to answer. Yes, there are so many things not to like about the man. But I’ve always respected a man who means what he says, and says what he means. Regardless of what you think about O’Reilly, you always know what he’s thinking. There’s nothing phony about the guy. What you see is what you get. Unfortunately, what you see isn’t always pretty.

Which brings me to this. I was trolling Politico.com for amusement this evening when I came across a clip from last night’s edition of the O’Reilly Factor. No need to watch the whole thing, the first couple minutes will suffice.



Let’s get this part out of the way first. If any of those leaks about Sarah Palin are true; that she didn’t know which countries signed the North American Free Trade Agreement, that she thought Africa was a country and not a continent, or that she refused to be prepped for the Katie Couric interview, then blamed he aides for not prepping her when the interview went... sour, thank God in Heaven she was not elected vice-president of the United States. At least Joe Biden only says stupid things.

But this is less about Sarah Palin and more about Bill O’Reilly. Although I can’t understand why Republican operatives would lie to the senior political correspondent of Fox News, I can’t verify whether or not the allegations made by nameless campaign sources are true. But in the following respect, it doesn’t really matter. When O’Reilly heard the anecdotes Carl Cameron was relaying to him, the correct response would have been, “...come on Carl, do you have any hard evidence for those allegations,” or perhaps, “...wow Carl, I had no idea Sarah Palin was so incredibly unprepared to even wake up in the morning,” or maybe even, “you know what Carl, I’m just going to pretend I didn’t hear you say any of those things and continue with my pre-determined line of questioning.” But no. What did Bill say? “...Well, she could be tutored on those things... there must be something more here...”

Excuse me? She could be tutored on those things? WHAT?!? Is Bill O’Reilly seriously trying to tell me that it’s not a big deal that the potential vice president doesn’t know which countries are involved in NAFTA and that Africa is actually a continent because she can learn that sort of thing on the job? I’ll check with my mom tomorrow, but I’m pretty sure I was about three years old when I learned that Africa was a continent and South Africa a country within it! I’d be willing to bet that the fifth graders she gave a “shout out” to during the vice presidential debate know which countries signed the North American Free Trade Agreement, seeing as how there are only three countries in North America! I’m sorry, but it is not okay that the V.P candidate the Republican Party tried to foist upon this nation may not be smarter than a fifth grader! And the fact that a man like O’Reilly would help perpetrate this fraud on the American people by espousing his sincere belief that deficiencies such as those just aren’t a big deal, is nothing short of ludicrous!

Bill, I feel sorry for you. And that’s no small feat considering you are about 6 inches taller and a hundred million dollars richer than I am. Obviously things didn’t turn out the way you would have preferred them to. But you have to accept the fact that the Republican Party was complicit in its own demise. Contrary to what you seem to believe, it does matter that a 44-year-old state governor may not know the difference between a continent and a country. It is evidence that the Republican leadership thought so little of the rest of us that they felt they could throw any old “real American” small town Joe six-pack pit-bull hockey mom on the ticket, tell us she was more qualified than the opposition and have us buy into it. Unfortunately, you did. I expected more of you. Maybe I shouldn’t have.