He makes a big deal out of how happy he is to have Senator Clinton on, how surprised he is that she was willing to talk to him, and then asks his first question:

O’REILLY: Can you believe this Reverend Wright guy? Can you believe this guy?

CLINTON: Well, you know…

O’REILLY: What do you think?

CLINTON: Well, I’m going to leave it up to voters to decide, you know.

O’REILLY: No, but what do you think as an American? You’re an American.

CLINTON: Well, what I said when I was asked directly is that I would not have stayed in that church.

O’REILLY: No, no, no, no. But you’re an American citizen. I’m an American citizen. He’s an American citizen, Reverend Wright. What do you think when you hear a fellow American citizen say that stuff about America? What do you think?

CLINTON: Well, I take offense at it. I think it’s offensive and outrageous. And, you know, I’m going to express my opinion. Others can express theirs. But, you know, it is part of, you know, just an atmosphere that we’re in today where all kinds of things are being said. And people have to, you know, decide what they believe. And I sure don’t believe the United States government was behind AIDS.

O’REILLY: Now, when I see people jumping up and applauding when he says that, and other things — we’re the moral equivalent of Al Qaeda — when I see my fellow citizens, I don’t care what color they are, jump up and applaud that, that disturbs me.

CLINTON: Well, Bill, this is part of the mosaic and diversity of America. And obviously, on opinions like that…

O’REILLY: That’s hateful.

And it goes on from there.  Full transcript available here.

What the hell?  Seriously, you applaud the guest who’s willing to talk to you, and then spend the first several minutes discussing what’s going wrong with the other candidate’s campaign?  Senator Clinton’s trying to take the high road and avoid trashing her opponent, but Bill just won’t let her.  So here we have him trying to make her look bad (getting her to talk poorly about her opponent) while reminding the public what’s wrong with the other democratic candidate.  Bravo, Bill.

At the beginning of the interview, O’Reilly suggests that Reverend Wright’s most recent remarks have been a deliberate attempt to hurt Obama’s campaign for some reason. “I’m gonna say that there’s a resentment of some kind… on the part of Wright, towards Obama,” O’Reilly said, before calling the reverend a “calculator” and emphasizing the “tens of millions of dollars” that his church has raised “peddling this hate.”  “He knows it’s good for business,” O’Reilly asserts finally.

What I found interesting was that Rove was arguing that Obama should admit that he made a mistake in not being more forthright about his relationship with Reverend Wright, while O’Reilly was arguing that Obama made a “political calculation” in downplaying the relationship, and to apologize now would only further discredit him.

Rove: Why did you (Obama) sit there (in the church) for so long? That’s the question.

O’Reilly: I’ll tell you why he sat there.  I’ll tell you why.  Wanna know why?  It’s just like the 10,000 square-foot-house is the key to Wright’s motivations now, here’s why he sat there:  He made a calculation, Barack Obama did, that by being in this church, his political fortunes would be improved in the south side of Chicago.  That calculation came true.

So our represented views are: Obama made a mistake vs Obama is a calculator, just like his pastor.  And O’Reilly was the one who seemed to be defending Obama — at least, that’s what he seemed to think he was doing.  Where’s the fairness and balance of which you speak?

I will say, though, that it was very gracious of Fox to label Wright “Obama’s Former Pastor” rather than “Obama’s Spiritual Adviser” as they had been in the past.

Question #1: …Senator, why are you having such trouble convincing white working class voters that you’re their guy?

Question #2: …Bob Herbert, columnist for the New York Times, happens to be a black man, says that Hillary Clinton seems tougher than you do.

Question #4: Senator, for all your efforts to run a post-racial campaign, isn’t there still a racial divide in this country that is going to make it very hard for you to get elected president?

Question #5: Congressman James Clyburn, one of the top African American politicians in this country, said this week that blacks are furious with Bill Clinton for playing the race card. Do you agree with him that there’s been a deliberate effort by the former president and some Clinton supporters to make race an issue in this Democratic race?

Questions 8-19 dealt with Obama’s relationship with Rev. Wright

This out of 23 total questions before the first break.

This station criticized black Americans for supporting Obama based on their shared race, crying that color shouldn’t matter in the election. Yet they seem to be working pretty darn hard to create a divide between black America and white America.

Here’s another classic example of a paradox of recognition:

By trying to argue that Colmes gives Fox’s reporting balance, they’re recognizing that there’s an opposing force against which he’s working.  Colmes being the pet liberal of the network, arguing that he’s the balancing force recognizes that there’s a greater conservative force to be balanced.

…Nevermind the fact that he’s failing miserably.

The dissimilar circumstances under which the two hosts came to Fox News are revealing. Recruited from Atlanta’s talk radio scene by Roger Ailes, Hannity was hired so far in advance of a decision about a co-host that Fox staffers referred to the show as “Hannity & Liberal To Be Determined,” or “LTBD.” Finally, after auditioning prospective left hosts, Colmes won the job–after Hannity expressed his preference for the mild-mannered New York radio host (Newsday, 10/20/98).

The Democratic race is race-based! (Although he graciously grants that Obama “has not yet played the race card”, which he later contradicts, saying that the campaign should avoid “race-baiting”)

If a white man is racist for refusing to vote for Obama because he’s black, then a black man who votes for Obama because he is black, he’s racist, too!

Is the North Carolina Republican Part anti-Obama ad racist? Watch it and decide for yourself!

Famous black man (Wesley Snipes) convicted on tax charges! See many clips of videos which show him walking around with other black men who support him, and watch me ask another famous black man (Judge Mathis) what he thinks of the situation (in which he’ll use words like “we”, meaning “we who make millions” not “we black men,” but makes the association anyway).

Bill Clinton is racist!

And, the kicker…

Sherri Shepherd (co-host of The View) is a “Pinhead” for explaining why black people would want to vote for a black man.  Apparently explaining that there is a difference between the experiences of white Americans and black Americans, and wanting to choose the person who will best represent you means that you’re voting solely based on skin color.

Bill’s closing remark: “Enough of the color thing already.”  After a completely race-based show.

Wow.

I’ve been watching the coverage of the new anti-Obama ad, in which it’s discussed as a newsworthy piece (OVER AND OVER).  Every time it appears in news coverage, the ad itself is aired (often in its entirety), giving it free airtime.  The ad isn’t even supposed to run until Monday (April 28).

Usually, the coverage mentions McCain’s condemnation of the ad, which helps McCain in two ways: gets to show him taking the high road by criticizing the ad, while still showing people the ad.

Bill O’Reilly introduced the clip by saying, “We’ll show it, you decide.”   The fact that we, the audience, is asked to decide anything about the ad means that it’s working.

Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks.

Essentially, some media analysts were granted special access to information in exchange for more favorable coverage.  Are the consumers made aware of these dealings?  Nope.  The networks weren’t always aware of them.

One of the sources quotes was former Fox News analyst and retired Green Beret Robert S. Bevelacqua, who the Times quoted as saying “It was them saying, ‘We need to stick our hands up your back and move your mouth for you.’”

Another analyst cited in the report was John C. Garret, a retired Marine colonel and unpaid analyst for — you guessed it — Fox News.  He was a happy little puppet — the Times quoted a message in which he implored, “Please let me know if you have any specific points you want covered or that you would prefer to downplay.”

Other Fox News analysts included William V. Cowan, General Paul Vallely, Charles T. Nash, Timur J. Eads, General Thomas McInerney, and Robert Scales.

In fact, the article says, the largest segment of the recruited analysts was affiliated with Fox News.

So far, Fox has made no mention of the report.  In fact, on Monday (April 21) and Wednesday (April 23),
Robert Scales appeared on the network to weigh in with his expertise.

They’ll never learn, will they?

“Relying on the Fox News Channel as your only source of news is like using MAD Magazine as a legitimate source of news. The Fox News Channel’s reporting style is so biased and skewed that trying to obtain any real information from a news report is quite challenging. Fox News is a joke because it provides info-tainment rather than reality-based news coverage. Fox News Channel is a ‘news channel’ in name only. The network is what L.A. Times Editor John S. Carroll calls ‘pseudojournalism.’”

Here is a great article from TurnOffYourTv.com that outlines some of the central problems of FNC, the viewership, as well as plenty of amusing graphics and charts.  My favorite part was the bullet-point lists of the ways in which Fox distorts.

Take a look!

Now, since on March 3, Obama explicitly stated that his willingness to meet with adversaries that Bush had shunned DID NOT include Hamas, there’s no way Hannity would twist this against him. After all, it would be foolish to try and illustrate his perception of Obama’s policy by using an example that Obama EXPLICITLY EXCLUDED from the policy… right?

Apparently not.

…I don’t even know what to say.

All I heard while O’Reilly was talking was “WAHHHH.”

The first thing O’Reilly says to Stewart (after a canned “Welcome”) is that it’s “frightening” that he has an influence on the election. From there, he continually insists that only “stoned slackers” watch the show, claiming that he has the information that 87% of Stewart’s viewers are intoxicated while watching the program. No citation on where the statistic comes from. He calls the show and the viewers “dopey”.

Stewart is actually pretty good-natured about Bill’s smarmy remarks. In response to O’Reilly’s butthurt whining that “John Kerry bypassed me and went right over to you” (gee, Bill, could that be because your station blasted him every chance they got?), Stewart deadpans that “I hafta tell you, and I mean no disrespect, but the snack selection backstage… I don’t want to say Guantanamo Bay, but it’s a little spare back there.”

About halfway through, things actually start to get a little more respectful, possibly because O’Reilly catches on that Stewart isn’t rising to the bait, and that he’s making himself look like an ass. It all goes downhill when Stewart mentions that Kerry may have come on his show to reach a new audience, and O’Reilly can’t resist adding, “the stoned slackers.” Again, Stewart responds seamlessly with some deadpan humor.

It seemed pretty clear that O’Reilly was looking for a fight. Stewart made no critical remarks about his show, and instead kept the discussion civil, mature and kept the level of discourse fairly intelligent. Points for him.

The “stoned slackers” assertion was amusing… Apparently intelligent, sober adults can’t appreciate political satire.

Or, apparently they can, according to this AP article.

“Viewers of Jon Stewart’s show are more likely to have completed four years of college than people who watch “The O’Reilly Factor,” according to Nielsen Media Research.”

I don’t know where the “87% of viewers are intoxicated” stat came from, but I can’t imagine how anyone would measure something like that.

The difference between Stewart and O’Reilly is that Stewart is a comedian on a comedy channel, and his show is exclusively billed as entertainment. The O’Reilly factor, however, is on a news channel, and bills itself as a “No Spin Zone”.