Bill O'Reilly tries to argue reasonably, fails

Doc Searls mentions a recent Bill O’Reilly interview on NPR’s Fresh Air where O’Reilly decided the whole thing was a hatchet job and stormed out rather than answer a question. Now, if you’ve got 40 minutes to spare, listen to the whole thing. When you’re done with that, let’s look at some of the issues in more detail.

I will say, first of all, that from this interview O’Reilly often appears reasonable, and although I disagree with him on many issues, I agree with him on others. I’m concerned, though, that as soon as conversation veers onto difficult issues, he gets defensive, goes personal, and ultimately ducks the issues, often with jesuitical rhetorical flourishes.

Let’s deal with the O’Reilly spin first. let’s hear what Bill O’Reilly has to say about selective quoting:

From roughly 5:40 into the show: “If you read the transcript of that interview […] You should get the full transcript, it’s easily available.”

From about 6:50: “They took it out of context, they didn’t print the whole interview to show what the guy’s wild allegations were”.

Fair enough. But wait: let’s look at Bill’s own take on the whole thing. An excerpt from the interview (via the Bill O’Reilly site, starts at roughly 32:55 and finishes at 39:02) doesn’t mention the previous part of the interview, nor what happened afterwards. Note also the leading question:

Was the National Public Radio interview fair and balanced? Was Bill treated differently than other guests? Listen for yourself and then YOU decide.

NPR says it best:

From roughly 1:55: “If you want to hear the complete interview, here is the place to listen.”

Then let’s look at the right-wing press coverage of the whole affair. From the Naples Daily News comes the claim “There wasn’t one question of O’Reilly about his new book.”.

You could have fooled me. Irrespective of how often he himself mentioned his book, between 19:25 and at least 31:30 into the interview - 12 entire minutes out of the 40 minutes that the interview was supposed to last - O’Reilly is asked personal, book-related autobiographical questions unrelated to his current radio show or his current persona. Check it out for yourself - sorry, this isn’t something I can synthesize into a soundbite, and you’re better off streaming it than downloading it.

Or let’s look at the Al Franken issue.

From 4:30ish: “There are people who enjoy reading and listening to people who attack other people with whom they disagree personally - let’s forget the issues, let’s try to destroy the person.”

But earlier, from 3:50 into the interview: “Why would anybody take anything that he says seriously - he’s an activist that propagandises and demonises.”

Note to Bill: you can’t complain about ad hominem attacks, and then respond with another ad hominem attack.

Further on in the interview, he contradicts himself at a rate of, roughly, an exa-shitload of nautical miles per hour. (Note: this made-up Imperial measurement may not exist.) Slightly re-arranged for dramatic effect (but the original starts at 10:40 roughly), here’s his take on the claim that he said he won a Peabody award:

Yes: “My former programme Inside Award won a Poke I called it a Peabody”; no: “I never said I won a Peabody award at any time, alright? That’s the fact”; no again: “By saying in her review that I said I won a Peabody, that is an absolute lie”; back to yes: “Twice on the Factor I corrected that”; yes again: “I said, hey, these guys won a Peabody, I mispoke, it was a Poke, who cares?”; but hey, let’s give no one last try: “[…] I did not say that I won any award. […] She wasn’t quoting anyone. There’s no quotes around that, madam, and if you read the article you’ll see there’s no quotes around it.”

Look, Bill, either you were wrong and you corrected yourself, or your accusers are themselves 100% wrong. It can’t be both. Unless, of course, he’s been Clinton-like and playing on the distinction between him winning an award and his programme winning an award.

As for the issue of “Janet Maslin wasn’t quoting Al Franken, there are no quote marks, she was defaming me”, let’s look at the original article

In a book that baits its targets with varying degrees of success, Mr. Franken makes a bull’s-eye out of Mr. O’Reilly. First the prize: he shows how Mr. O’Reilly’s erroneous claim that he won a Peabody Award evolved into even bigger fibs once it was challenged.

She’s summarising a section of the book - of course there are no quotes. It’s still sourced from Franken’s book.

Incidentally, at about 7:30 he mentions that he’s only told people to shut up “5 times in 7 years”, and the rest of the time it was a joke. I don’t have time to investigate this fully - that’s one for the rest of the bloggers - but the “it was a joke” excuse is one of the most tired and hackneyed get-out clauses of all time.

There’s a bunch of other stuff, but the best part is towards the end. I’ve elided parts, but here’s the best stuff. (The mp3 has the entire sequence.)

NPR: “I’ll read what the People magazine thinks” BOR: “Why? Why read it? […] There’s no reason for you to read that People magazine review; if they want to read it, they can go and read it.”
NPR: “This isn’t a review of the book, this is the the review of how you handled it […] It’s OK to ask you to be accountable for the things that you said.”
BOR: “Did you challenge [Al Franken] on what he said?”
NPR: “We had a different interview.” […] BOR: “Were you as tough on Al Franken as you were on me?” NPR: “No […] Al Franken had written a book of political satire:” BOR: […] “Calling people liars and distorting their faces on the book cover, that’s satire now, is it? And my book, who’s looking out for you, who’s designed to help people […] you’re easy on Franken and you challenge me?”

I like how O’Reilly has just said how his book is far more worthy, far more important than a random hack job like Franken’s book, and then he doesn’t understand why he gets more scrutiny. Oh, and for what it’s worth, calling people liars and photoshopping their faces is pretty close to the dictionary definition of satire in the early 2000s. And why is he so adamant to suppress an on-air quote of a book review, when he’s spent so much time talking about facts and opinions and how he’s not prejudiced in any way?

Well, let’s see the final word that NPR has, after Bill O’Reilly has stormed off:

NPR: “Oh, so you’re not even going to give me the chance to ask you a follow-up question, you have to make a speech and then have the last word?”
People magazine (quoted by NPR): “I was O’Reilly’s ‘Most Ridiculous Item Of The Day’. The big guy said ‘Review the book, not me.’ Then he called me a pin-head. Consistency isn’t his best feature.”