Just to clarify, CNN and ABC are not free. -- You pay for CNN through your cable bill. -- You pay for ABC and all of the other broadcast networks by giving their affiliates the public airwaves without just compensation. -- You pay for Fox News with dying brain cells. Or, in Ian's case, with ejaculated semen during any Brit Hume segment.
She has to be one of the worst and most illprepared interviewers I have ever heard. But Bill did sound like an ass at the end. He would have been smarter to just end the interview on grounds that it clearly turned from being about his book and more about him. And boy she sounded like a bitch right at the very end. Nice try sounding incredulous.
Rush speaks again... "I think what we've had here is a little social concern at NPR. The media has been very desirous that a left-wing political satirist do well. There is a little hope invested in Franken, and he's gotten a lot of credit for the performance of his book that he didn't deserve. Bill carried that book."
I would agree that the interviewer definitely dropped the ball, she just wasn't prepared at crucial times during the conversation. But O'Reilly flew off the handle for no reason whatsoever, it made me think he had it planned all along. She brought her toughest questions to him in the first 10 minutes, then threw him softballs for half an hour, then tried to get back to some of O'Reilly's hypocrisy and he lost his marbles.
After dwelling on it more, I've come to the same conclusion: it was a shallow publicity stunt, one that allows him to play both victim and tough guy. He is not a journalist. As for whether Terry Gross was prepared, well, I disagree. I can't say that I love her; I think there are many better interviewers out there. But the expectation of an NPR interview is civility, which O'Reilly clearly doesn't recognize. I watched the segment on his show last night in which he "discussed" the interview. He played the last minute or two of the interview (without including the question that set him off, which, you'll recall, was a chance for him to respond to a negative comment made by a book reviewer) and then claimed that they were out to get him the whole time. No mention was made of the 20 or so minutes of bland conversation regarding his relationship with his dad, etc. This was so misleading that it could only be described as dishonest. I have no great love for Al Franken--I think he's funny, but I'd rather see someone attempt to elevate the discussion than lower himself to the level of the Coutlers and O'Reillys of the world--but he's right. As the cliche goes, a lie of omission is still a lie. Bill O'Reilly is a liar.
Agreed, I just thought she dropped the ball being unprepared at crucial moments. NPR is definitely known for being much more mellow, civil as you say. And here's the thing. Early on in the interview, the excerpt from his show that was published in Harper's was discussed. He rails against Harper's and others for not publishing the entirety of the interview to show that the guy that he chewed out (had family that were victims of 9/11, but signed a petition saying that US policies had something to do with Arab hostility towards our nation) and kicked him off of his show, because he had been dishonest and a liar early in the interview (not included in the Harper's excerpt.) O'Reilly confirms his own hypocrisy by doing the exact thing he condemned Harper's for on his own show. Fair and balanced my ass. Just like a lot of left-wing (Michael Moore, Franken) or right-wing (Coulter et. al.) commentators, he is nothing more than a propagandist, using news items to further his own agenda, in many instances to do nothing more than fatten his ratings or his pocketbook.
This thread title is oxymoronic. "Fresh air" and "Bill O'reilly" should never be used in the same sentence.
I listened to that interview. Terri was pitching softball after softball after softball. That's not necessarily a bad thing. Not every radio interview has to be a third degree interrogation. In this case, O'Reilly was just full of himself though, and she could have played with it. When she said that she was lighter on Al Franken, the only thing I could think of was, how much lighter could you have been? I didn't hear the Franken interview, so I can't compare. But O'Reilly was handled with kid gloves. As for Franken's book, I skimmed it, including the chapter on O'Reilly. I personally thought he didn't have too much on him. He was able to skewer Coulter a lot more, and of course "bitch slap" Bernie Goldberg.
I haven't read Franken's book, but my understanding that he has only two things on Reilly. --The Polk/Peabody snafu --The voter registration of him as a republican I find Bill O'Reilly generally quite distasteful. But if that's all he's got on him, well, it ain't much, and it certainly ain't worthy of calling him a "lying liar" full of lies. Al Franken uses Harvard stationery to see if he can't get some funny little piece of poop on John Ashcroft? Is he a "lying liar" then? Look, all of you leftists out there may or may not like O'Reilly, but the one thing he does do is some real journalism and investigative reporting. He is trying to be serious. But what is Al Franken? Is he really serious? He hides behind the barrier of comedian/satirist, but I believe that deep down in his heart he wants to be a credible social and political commentator. Can you be a true social and political commentator when you pull a sophomoric stunt like the Harvard stationery crap? That's damning evidence, it seems to me, that you are just a jokester when all the veneer is stripped away.
Re: Re: Fresh Air and Bill O'Reilly I've seen O'Reilly's show a few times and with that limited input my impression is that he mistakes volume for logic and reiteration for corroboration. Just keep saying it and keep saying it loud and you'll win the argument. And his tantrum on Fresh Air did nothing to change that. However ... I was very surprised to hear he was against the death penalty, pro-legalization of marijuana and some other position (I can't remember) which made me think: Hmm, maybe he's not a cyborg. And he did deign to reconsider Terry Gross' point that Janet Maslin (or some other NY Times reviewer) did not give Michael Moore's book a completely favorable review. So the NPR show was odd in that I started to lose my admittedly knee-jerk distaste for him ... and then immediately reacquired it by the end of the interview. And the what threw him into a bullying tantrum were questions about him being a bully on the show and using his national forum to bully people such as book reviewers who gave him a decent review in the first place. Al Franken is a satirist. And here's a news flash: Many if not most satirists of note are political. So, I think it's completely within reason to treat Al Franken differently than O'Reilly. Just as it would to treat Jon Stewart, Dennis Miller, Bill Maher etc., as satirists (even though it would be equally fair to treat two out of three of those as morons). One is critiquing a news source. One is claiming to be a fair and balanced news source. I think that's a big difference. In addition, methinks his wild and woolly persecution complex is nothing but a brilliant self-promoting ploy: "I'm so-o-o-o important that the NY Times and the entire liberal media cabal has put a fatwa on my head. Therefore listen to me to get the truth they don't want you to hear." Hilarious, yet genius. I mean, either that or he's batsh!t nuts. PS: just out of curiosity -- and I honestly don't know the answer to this -- what's the consensus here on how O'Reilly would treat guests on his show who had made simple mistakes like the Peabody award and the party registration. I agree those are measly points at best, but were the lamb in the other pen....
How about ticked off because they provided their donor list to the Democratic National Committee? Is that what they call fair and unbiased public radio?
Re: Re: Re: Fresh Air and O'Relly http://freshair.npr.org/day_fa.jhtml?displayValue=day&todayDate=10/08/2003
Re: Re: Rush speaks again... Come on, give him a break. Who could be coherent with all those drugs in his body?
Do O'Rielly and Franken have the same publisher? Because incidents like this will help sell both books like hotcakes.
People don't donate to NPR. They donate to individual radio stations which are independently operated.
There are a couple of other tidbits as well. Franken addresses O'Reilly's denial that he called for a boycott of Ludicrus, O'Reilly's claims about his upbringing (pretty worthless attack by Franken), O'Reilly's mystery novel (which is about as grusome as the stuff that O'Reilly criticizes as lacking American values), as well as O'Reilly's claim that Franken had unfairly doctored photos of him to make him look bad. There were probably a couple of other things as well. But overall, Franken had a lot more on others.
Because the Republicans forgot to ask and pay for it? Many local stations sell (or used to sell) their donor lists to direct marketers. NPR tries really hard to be bipartisan, up to the point that now Newt Gingrich is fan. And yes, Daniel Shorr is still there.
O'Reilly is a disingenuous, lying, cry baby and bully. He is intellectually very weak, much like Sean Hannity. I laugh at both of them.
Here's one link. I can't do all your research for you. It was in all the papers. Buried, of course, because it exposes liberal bias, but it was there nonetheless. The PBS-Democrat Complex is Exposed
Give me a source that's not masquerading as an objective media critic and maybe I'll acept his one-sided spin on the story. http://www.creators.com/opinion_Shell.cfm?pg=biography.html&columnsname=bbo And I did do some looking into this, since I don't accept Bozell's take. Yeah it's quite true that WGBH employees sold donor lists to the DNC. But you can't just paint all of PBS with this broad brush because of that... It seems to me that PBS and NPR are just straight-up whores for money, not just DNC money. Maybe if they were better funded...
If they were better funded, they'd just be bigger whores. I'm surprised the liberals are such big fans of corporate welfare.