Karma’s a bitch.
They’re out to get him, but it’s Bill’s response that has me flummoxed.
Why does everybody in power double-down, why do they try and blow their attacker’s house down? It makes men look foolish, that they can’t admit that they are wrong, believing he with the biggest megaphone wins when it really just makes them look like a blowhard.
I don’t care whether Bill O’Reilly reported from a war zone or not.
But the truth is this guy is such a bully that people are afraid to contradict him. It’s kind of like Kanye. What do we hear when Kanye begins his shenanigans? Crickets. And when Bill O’Reilly twists the truth and trumpets insignificant, made-up canards like the War on Christmas? Not much.
Actually, we heard some blowback on the War on Christmas, but that’s just a sideshow to the big stuff, we tire of responding to him and then he gets away with so much.
But this is what the world has devolved into. One of gotcha and denial.
And this is not like the Obama birth certificate fracas. You don’t respond to trolls. And Bill O’Reilly could have ignored “Mother Jones.” But he chose not to. He chose to get on his high horse and contradict the truth, the footage and the other newsmen in attendance in Argentina.
I don’t want Bill O’Reilly to lose his job. I don’t think his offense is equal to Brian Williams’s. Then again, this is not the first time O’Reilly has bent the truth/lied. But I do want to point out that just because you’re famous and powerful you do not get a pass. Just because you can marshal flacks and TV power, you’re not entitled to have things go your way.
And what kind of bizarre world do we live in where celebrities get more leeway than politicians? The Governor of Oregon had to go, Kanye’s left unscathed.
Everybody’s afraid. It’s like the world has turned into high school. And the nerds did not inherit the earth. We’re all using their devices, but they’ve got no power over the organization, how things run. No nerd is Frank Underwood.
So, if you get in trouble, if you do something wrong, APOLOGIZE!
It won’t hurt your credibility, it will only increase it.
And if you think your attackers are only out to get you, to tear you down, because they’re jealous and want your job, IGNORE THEM! Defending yourself in this case doesn’t work, the trolls will just change focus.
So, Bill O’Reilly, you’re losing here. Fox is never going to fire you, you’re their cash cow. You could have said you stretched the truth, you could have said it was in the past, you could have ignored it.
But no, you had to be superior, you had to be invulnerable, and now you’re looking like a pussy who’s just waiting for the principal to step in. You’re like a football player or frat brother who vows to get even, scaring the pipsqueaks into sleeping with one eye open.
And one of the great things about leaving school is you leave the schoolyard behind. There’s real justice. You can’t punch someone in the face, you can’t do something illegal, we’re all safe, all protected by the rule of law.
But O’Reilly is an adolescent.
Why do we pay attention to him?
Because we’re tribal. We need an enemy to point out everything keeping us back. That’s right, if you just dismantled the government everything would be cool. And it’s Bill who’s standing up for the little guy.
WAKE UP!
Bill is only standing up for himself, he only cares about himself, he needs your adulation to survive. And if it’s threatened, if there’s a chink in the armor, his whole enterprise caves.
Once again, this is different from Brian Williams. Williams was an empty suit. Williams was a newsreader. Whereas Bill O’Reilly keeps telling us he’s standing up for the truth.
Ain’t that a laugh.
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If you need an example of what it means to apologize here is one of the current best Benedicy Cumberbatch: “I’m devastated to have caused offence by using this outmoded terminology. I offer my sincere apologies. I make no excuse for my being an idiot and know the damage is done.”
The 99% of Americans can that do not watch Fox laughs at O’Reilley.
Fox: O’Reilly Didn’t See Bombings In Ireland, But He Saw Photos Of Them
The Washington Post spotted a passage in O’Reilly’s 2013 book, “Keep It Pithy,” in which he described seeing lethal bombings in Northern Ireland.
“I’ve seen soldiers gun down unarmed civilians in Latin America, Irish terrorists kill and maim their fellow citizens in Belfast with bombs,” O’Reilly wrote.
A Fox spokesperson told the Washington Post that O’Reilly did not witness any bombings or injuries in Northern Ireland but was simply shown photos by police officers
NB: Enough already. Only people who thought Newt Gingrich was intelligent and capable of honorable governance believed a flame-throwing, bullying bullshitter like O’Reilly had anything to do with news and honest analysis.
O’Reilly is no different than virtually every other person on air at Fox. We have vast political ignorance due, in part, to Fox. Since this is the only time calling out lies on Fox has gotten any traction, let it continue. And it will continue as long as Fox continues to deny.
You don’t want him to lose his job? Then you are condoning a bully who is also a liar.
You hear crickets because no one is watching! Other than the clip of Bill and Barney Frank yelling, he’s not even entertaining let alone factual.
I haven’t been paying attention. How is it different from the Brian Williams stuff?
Who is Bill O’Reilly ?
“… You could have said you stretched the truth, you could have said it was in the past, you could have ignored it…”
Bullies can’t listen to the “But you were wrong before” Listen to Bush and Cheney, they still say they’re right. The GOP can’t take back any of their Obama is going to ruin American capitalism nonsense.
When you meet a bully like O’Reilly, stay close when he slips up, take him down hard and blare it to the rooftops. That will shut them up from mouthing off around you. Humiliate them.
There have been few more prescient words than those spoken by Paddy Chayefsky’s character in “Network:” “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take it anymore.”
I’m not sure, however, that Chayefsky ever imagined how through the looking glass a media outlet like Fox News could become…or maybe he did.
Of course Bill O-Reilly should be fired (or”take a leave of absence” ). He is a bully and a blow hard. It is great that all this is coming out. Sadly I wish that less that only 1 % of people watched Faux News as Venndata implies- unfortunately at least 33% of americans watch it routinely (that is the approx number of people that identify as republicans) and it has so distorted our politics that the dept of homeland security ( an orwellian name if there ever was one) is about to be shut down because of some idiots in congress that have their underwear in a twist over some conceived slight by a black president. That is directly because of the power of Faux News.