New Information About Ayers and His Association With Obama

Bill O'Reilly's October 22nd Talking Points Memo

Nobody disputes that Bill Ayers was a terrorist. His ideology was extreme back in the Vietnam War Era and he took measures that I find wrong. He has not engaged in terrorist activity since then. The fact that he is not repentant plays little or no part in his relationship with Barack Obama. Basically, Mr. O'Reilly has joined in John McCain and Sarah Palin's last ditch effort to blacken the name of Barack Obama and prevent him from getting elected by scaring voters. John McCain has had a close relationship to Charles Keating who was jailed for fraud, racketeering, and conspiracy related to the savings and loan scandal of the late 80's. McCain was criticized for poor judgment in his dealings with Mr. Keating. Obama, however, has nothing to be sorry about in his dealings with Mr. Ayers. They were on a board together and did not participate in anything illegal. I don't know about the rest of America, but if placed on a board with someone who had done something bad in the past, I would not shun him or decline to take the position because he was there. Now, if Mr. Ayers asked me to join him in some terrorist activity, I would decline and notify the proper authorities. This, however, did not happen.

Obviously Mr. O'Reilly has already made up his mind about Barack Obama. Does the Ayers connection to Obama affect that decision? If John McCain were associated in the same manner with Mr. Ayers would Mr. O'Reilly care? I submit that he would not. The situation is this: to Mr. O'Reilly the issues are of prime importance here. He has his take on those issues and is dead set to convince America that he is right. Well, let me rephrase that. He isn't dead set to convince America he is right on the issues. He is dead set to convince America to vote for his candidate. This is why both John McCain and Bill O'Reilly have been promoting the Ayers connection. They know that on issues alone, the majority of America does not agree with John McCain and will vote for Barack Obama. So, in order to sway the "undecided" voters (I call them undecided, but they are really the voters who can be intimidated), they try to scare voters into thinking Barack Obama is a terrorist by proxy of having associated with Bill Ayers in the past. It is very sad when politics are reduced to name calling and hearsay.

And that's "The CounterPoints Memo."

The Truth Matters

Bill O'Reilly's July 30th Talking Points Memo

I have come to the conclusion that Mr. O'Reilly spends as much time complaining about other networks as he does reporting "news." It is incredibly ironic when he goes on a rant about truth and news. "What does matter is a news organization putting out falsehoods, and that happens all the time at NBC." Mr. O'Reilly's assertion that NBC puts out falsehoods is fairly outrageous given the evidence he provides to that point. Basically Mr. O'Reilly is claiming that because Scott McClellan responded to Chris Matthew's question "The people who say call Sean, call Bill, call whoever, did you do that at..." with "Certainly", that NBC is putting out falsehoods. First of all, let's be clear here. NBC asked the questions, but Mr. McClellan responded to them. If Mr. McClellan lied in his responses, that is not the fault of NBC, nor is it NBC that is putting out falsehoods. It would be Scott McClellan. What Mr. O'Reilly objects to is the fact that his name was implicated as a sounding board for the Bush Administration. The fact is that the response Scott McClellan gave was vague enough that neither Bill O'Reilly or Sean Hannity was officially implicated. The word "whoever" made the response ambiguous. So, it is not even true that Mr. McClellan lied to Chris Matthews unless it is false that Mr. McClellan talked to people from Fox News at all. So Mr. O'Reilly chose a very poor example to make his point.

This brings me to a potential paradox. Mr. O'Reilly claims that NBC puts out falsehoods. Mr. O'Reilly does not actually indicate any of those falsehoods (not legitimate ones, anyway). Without proper support for his statement, doesn't that make Mr. O'Reilly's claim a falsehood? And would that not also make Fox News responsible for putting out falsehoods? Of course, in this case one can't be sure whether Mr. O'Reilly is speaking the truth or not, simply because he provides no evidence and nobody is going to be able to prove otherwise. But, then, in the United States people are innocent until proven guilty. So, until Mr. O'Reilly presents some hard evidence to support his claim that NBC puts out falsehoods, it should be assumed to be false, or at least in error.

Like a pouting child, Mr. O'Reilly demands an apology from Scott McClellan. First of all, apologies are meant to be given, not taken. I don't think Scott McClellan had anything to apologize for, though he was gracious enough to apologize anyway since Mr. O'Reilly needed it so badly. But it becomes truly ludicrous in the following exchange:

MCCLELLAN: So you don't owe me an apology for calling me a liar or calling me...

O'REILLY: You were a liar. You said I received talking points and I didn't.

MCCLELLAN: No, I didn't. I was not confirming that. I'm telling you that right now, I was not...

O'REILLY: You're parsing the damn thing. Come on, be honest.

The fact is that Scott McClellan never said that Mr. O'Reilly received talking points or anything else for that matter. After reading this conversation, I truly think that Mr. O'Reilly should be apologizing to Mr. McClellan, not the other way around. But, since Mr. O'Reilly has such a huge ego, he can in no way make such an apology.

How does Mr. O'Reilly close things out? The way only he can: "Now I've had enough dishonesty from the media, and I'm betting you have, too. So we are going to confront blatant deception and go after the deceivers, no matter where they are. If we don't do that, no one will. Enough is enough. The spin stops here. And now so does the deception." First of all, this sounds like a direct quote from a President Bush speech...just replace deception with terrorism and deceivers with terrorists. Secondly, considering how deceptive Mr. O'Reilly already is with his right wing propaganda, I sincerely doubt he will be going after deceivers. It makes for some darn good rhetoric, though, doesn't it?

And that's "The CounterPoints Memo."

Smearing Fox News

Bill O'Reilly's July 24th Talking Points Memo

I don't really have much to say about Mr. O'Reilly's memo today except to point out a major logical flaw. Mr. O'Reilly asserts that "In short, we're fair. Our high ratings prove that." I had no idea that ratings determined truth and fairness. If that's the case, I guess "America's Got Talent" and "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?" must be the fairest shows out there. It is a sad state of affairs when someone is willing to assert that ratings prove fairness. Ratings simply show how many people are watching your show. Fairness is another topic altogether. To emphasize how fair Fox News is, today's "No Spin Poll" is "What is the most biased news outlet in America?" Their choices: "The New York Times", "MSNBC", "Associated Press", and "NPR." I notice that CNN and Fox News did not even make the list as options. That's fairness for you. And how about the "Line of the Night" which is "It is not a stretch to say MoveOn is the new Klan" as quoted by Bill O'Reilly. That's certainly a fair statement. I don't have a problem with a show that is obviously showing preference to a particular viewpoint, but don't even pretend to claim it is "Fair and Balanced" or a "No Spin Zone." Unfortunately, there are people that will believe what Mr. O'Reilly says about being unbiased and therefore take what he says as truth rather than opinion.

And that's "The CounterPoints Memo."

Murder in San Francisco

Bill O'Reilly's July 23rd Talking Points Memo

Awhile back Mr. O'Reilly wrote a memo concerning sanctuary cities and a robbery. Basically there was an illegal alien who robbed a store and was shot in the back by the store owner. Mr. O'Reilly contended that had the illegal been deported, the crime would never have happened and the guy would not be dead. I found Mr. O'Reilly's argument to be ludicrous because there is no connection between crime and illegal aliens. Crime rates are not excessive among illegal aliens, in fact, I would suspect illegal aliens would be especially law-abiding because they want to stay under the radar. In the aforementioned case, the only person hurt was the illegal alien himself. Now, though, Mr. O'Reilly has found a case where the illegal alien killed some American citizens. It's like a gold mine for his political ideology.

Unfortunately for Mr. O'Reilly, there is no connection between illegal aliens and crime. This would be a non-story for O'Reilly had an American citizen killed three people. But, because it was an illegal alien, Mr. O'Reilly has decided that this story is important. Why? Because Mr. O'Reilly is on a crusade to cleanse the United States from illegal immigration. There was a great conversation between Geraldo Rivera and Bill O'Reilly about this exact topic, though the issue was drunk driving rather than murder. Here is a video clip of the exchange. I support Geraldo's point 100%. So much, in fact, that I won't even try to do better.

This is going to be Mr. O'Reilly's crusade for awhile. I can only hope he doesn't incite vigilante justice on people simply because they entered the country illegally. There is a reason that no politician out there is willing to deport all the illegal immigrants in the United States.

And that's "The CounterPoints Memo."

Obama Goes to War Zones

Bill O'Reilly's July 22nd Talking Points Memo

It's time for a baseball infusion into Mr. O'Reilly's world. He's got Obama batting .500 and McCain batting .750 with regard to the whole Iraq war situation. Of course, McCain got an extra at-bat. Obama was correct about entering Iraq, but wrong about the surge. McCain was wrong about entering Iraq, correct that the war was fought ineptly, and correct about the surge. Why Obama doesn't get credit for claiming the war was fought ineptly is beyond me, but I will speculate that Mr. O'Reilly couldn't stand McCain and Obama having the same batting average, so he had to give McCain something else to be correct about. Also, Mr. O'Reilly is willing to give McCain a pass on his one "strikeout" because it was a "strikeout" for "most of us." Of course, this is subjective nonsense because I could give Obama a few more at-bats and he could have a higher batting average. At the very least, I suggest that Obama would also agree that the war has been fought ineptly. But that would just ruin the insightful message that Mr. O'Reilly is bringing to so many Americans.

It's amazing how many times Mr. O'Reilly can harp on the same points. Even more amazing is that he can harp on points that are so incredibly biased and flat wrong. Once again Mr. O'Reilly is claiming that the "far-left loons" and "America haters" "want us to lose in [Iraq]." How he comes up with these conclusions is a mystery to me. Disagreeing with the war in Iraq does not, and never will, imply a desire for the United States to lose in Iraq. Let me say that again. Disagreeing with the war in Iraq does not, and never will, imply a desire for the United States to lose in Iraq. It actually doesn't matter how many times I say it, Mr. O'Reilly will continue with his deluded thinking. After all, what better way to make a point than to smear the opposition with lies? Mr. O'Reilly probably figures if he says something enough times, it will become true. Unfortunately, with media in America today, that may not be far from the truth. Just look at the stats of FOX viewers who thought WMDs were found in Iraq. If memory serves, it was more than half.

I am particularly interested in one statement Mr. O'Reilly makes. "The truth is that much of the world...doesn't care how many brutal dictators commit mass murder." Obviously this remark is meant to highlight the humanitarian mission that the war in Iraq is. Mr. O'Reilly is making reference to murders and atrocities committed by Saddam Hussein. I believe that was excuse number two or three for entering Iraq back in the days that George W. Bush was attempting to justify his actions. Never mind that at the time we entered Iraq there were far more mass murders and atrocities taking place on the African continent. I would wager that Mr. O'Reilly has spent far more time talking about Iraq than about Africa. I would also wager that Mr. O'Reilly has spent far more time talking about terrorism associated with Iraq than atrocities committed in Iraq. But it's nice to know that Mr. O'Reilly is willing to bring up human rights issues when it suits his agenda.

At this point I thought Mr. O'Reilly had pushed the envelope enough, but he was not yet finished. "Just this weekend, [far-left loons] gathered in Texas for a hate America convention. And guess who showed up? Al Gore and Nancy Pelosi." First of all, what Mr. O'Reilly is calling a "hate America convention" is actually Netroots Nation 2008. I guess he didn't want people to know that because they might actually look up what it's all about. It is a group of bloggers, progressive activists, elected officials, and candidates for office who meet once a year to discuss current issues facing the world. How this turns in to a "hate America convention" defies logic. Having looked at the convention agenda, I wonder how such topics as "Energizing America: Setting an Agenda for Progress", "Growing the American Dream Movement", or "Netroots for the Troops Care Package Creation" could be considered hateful towards America. Sure, there are topics that criticize the government of the United States, but dissension is an American privilege. So when Mr. O'Reilly twists a well-meaning convention, a convention encouraging citizen participation in government, I am appalled.

Finally, Mr. O'Reilly drives home the point he is trying to make none too subtly. Come election time we need to consider what he's said and choose the candidate that will fight in Iraq and Iran and anywhere else terrorism exists (unfortunately this encompasses the globe, including the US). Now he doesn't suggest that everyone go out and vote for John McCain. That would not be his place. Never mind that O'Reilly suggests McCain is batting .750 while Obama is batting .500 with regard to Iraq. Never mind that O'Reilly suggests Obama is a part of a party that holds "hate America" conventions. He wants everyone to make up their own minds, and that's why he's not taking any chances by providing accurate information to the voters.

I really don't know why Mr. O'Reilly doesn't just wave a "vote for John McCain" sign.

And that's "The CounterPoints Memo."

Obama Self-Reliance Tour Kicks Into Action

Bill O'Reilly's July 16th Talking Points Memo

Let us begin this discussion with the supposition Mr. O'Reilly makes concerning the differences of Conservatives and Liberals. "Historically, conservatives have preached self-reliance and liberals have espoused government programs to level the playing field." I take a different approach to this difference. First, I find little use for the word "historically" when talking about liberals and conservatives (or Democrats and Republicans if you prefer). The parties of the United States have fluctuated much during the history of our nation. To suggest that Lincoln would be a Republican in the George W. Bush or Ronald Reagan sense of the word is fairly outrageous. In my mind, the parties made a reversal in ideology around the time of Woodrow Wilson. So when I use the term "historically", I will be referring to the recent past (no more than 100 years ago). Secondly, I think self-reliance is a mantra of both parties. The only caveat I would place on that is that the Democratic party tends to support taking care of those who can't take care of themselves more than the Republican party. Where my differentiation comes into play emphasizes the means to which people achieve their self-reliance, or more to the level at which they achieve it. The Republican party tends to favor non-intervention. People are born and they take matters into their hands and it's a survival of the fittest mentality, which, more often than not, turns into survival of the richest. The Democratic party, however, tends to favor "leveling the playing field" as Mr. O'Reilly puts it. Not leveling the playing field in terms of a socialist idea that everyone should have the same wealth, but rather a leveling of the playing field at the starting line. I look at it this way: some people are born wealthy, some people are born poor, some people live in inner city environments, some people live in the suburbs. Those born wealthy are basically born with a head-start in life. They get the best education, they have connections from their parents, they are expected to reach a certain spot in life and don't have to work very hard to get there. Compare that with the person born in poverty. They may find themselves going to an inner city school which is worn down and has generally poor educational value. They are at the back of the pack from birth. In order to achieve the same success as the wealthy-born person, they have to work ten times as hard and get some lucky breaks in life. Then you have someone born into the middle class. This person will probably get a decent education, though not as top-notch as the wealthy-born person. They will have to work probably three times as hard as the wealthy-born person to achieve the same results. So when Mr. O'Reilly mentions "level[ing] the playing field" with regard to Democrats, I think of that as leveling the starting line, rather than the playing field. Welfare, educational scholarships, and educational spending all go hand-in-hand with that. So the difference in ideology basically is that Democrats want everyone to have the same options in life from the beginning and Republicans want advantaged people to continue to have the advantage, though they certainly wouldn't phrase it like that. They would say something more to the effect of being for fairness (a term often used with regard to their philosophy on taxes, but that's another story). So now you can see where Mr. O'Reilly and myself differ on the self-reliance issue regarding Democrats and Republicans.

Unfortunately, Mr. O'Reilly takes his definition of party lines and self-reliance through the rest of his thought process. His basic assertion is that "[w]e still don't know Barack Obama" because he is taking a Republican value of self-reliance as his own. "Is he sincere?" O'Reilly asks. I'm certain you can see where I am going with this. Since I don't consider self-reliance as owned by the Republican party, I certainly don't see any conflict in Barack Obama supporting the typical party-line of the Democrats and also suggesting that people be more self-reliant. There is no policy in suggesting people be self-reliant. The policy all relates to how people become self-reliant and whether we assist those less fortunate than others to achieve that goal. But, in the black and white world of Mr. O'Reilly, the two are mutually exclusive. Hopefully one day Mr. O'Reilly can understand that the world is a huge shade of grey.

And that's "The CounterPoints Memo."

Winds of War in Middle East

Bill O'Reilly's June 26th Talking Points Memo

Bill O'Reilly presents somewhat of a paradoxical situation for us today. The lead story is that Israel is threatening to attack the Iranians if President Bush doesn't do something to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons capability. Later in his memo, Mr. O'Reilly indicates that this would cause "a full-fledged war" to break out in the Middle East and "few countries will help the Israelis." Given this information, it seems that the threat is fairly hollow. Why would Israel attack a country knowing full well that it would lead to their destruction? Really, though, this is beside the point. Israel knows that President Bush is the only person who would be crazy enough to attack Iran. After all, Bush had no problem invading Iraq. Israel also knows that it is unlikely they could get either Barack Obama or John McCain to agree to a war in Iran (even though Mr. O'Reilly simply points to Obama, I believe both candidates would be cautious about entering into another war while things are still not resolved in Iraq).

I think Mr. O'Reilly is absolutely correct that President Bush could not attack Iran without being vilified, though I think it is a stretch to suggest impeachment. I believe at this point, Bush is just waiting out the end of his term. He'll probably be taking some nice long vacations in Texas and maybe work to clean up his image for posterity.

I do find it interesting that Mr. O'Reilly mentions a full-fledged war in the Middle East, and puts all the focus on oil prices rising to over $200 a barrel and collapsing the economy. As important as oil is to our society, I hardly think that the price of oil rising that much would collapse the world economy. There would be hard times, certainly, but if so much was riding on the price of oil, the Middle East would have far more power today than they do. In other words, should the price of oil increasing create worldwide chaos, the big powers of the world would enter and take action. Yes, this could lead to another world war, which is exactly why the likelihood of it happening is minimal.

I get the distinct impression that Mr. O'Reilly assumes he is the only one who can figure out cause and effect in global politics. The countries in the Middle East are keenly aware that the happenings in the region dramatically effect other nations and that those other nations are willing to take action to prevent instability in the region. This doesn't mean that we should not pay attention or worry about what goes on in the Middle East, but rather that we should continue as we have been to promote peace in the region. As always, we should keep a close watch on those countries which might be researching the creation of nuclear weapons. We should use all the diplomatic means at our disposal to prevent that from happening. Should the situation warrant, and global opinion agree, we should use force if necessary. What we should not do, however, is go to war with Iran simply because if we don't, Israel will and that will cause lots of trouble. I don't believe each country in the Middle East is plotting to bring about the ruination of not only their, but all the other countries in the Middle East.

My major disagreement with Mr. O'Reilly comes when he suggests that "[f]ar-left loons continue to downplay the danger from [Iran]." I don't even have any facts with which to disagree with that statement. Why? Because I don't need any! Bill O'Reilly shows no legitimate evidence whatsoever to back up his claim. He moves right on to discuss the CEO of GE and how they still do business with Iran. If you're going to make a statement as inflammatory as that one, at least provide something to back it up. Otherwise, you're simply another hate spewing partisan pundit, which at this point I won't disagree with.

Now to Mr. O'Reilly's solution. He believes that a total economic boycott of Iran is the solution. He suggests this will "cause the country to collapse and the mullahs would be overthrown." I will go ahead with Mr. O'Reilly's logic here and assume exactly that will happen. Is there any indication that another regime more friendly to the United States or Israel would rise? Likely one bad regime would be replaced with another one, no doubt angrier at the United States for causing the country to collapse. Revolutions are bloody affairs and rarely end in a manner as peaceful as that of the United States. Also, the point of economic boycotts or sanctions are to convince the current government of a country that their policies are bad and need to change in order to restore order to their country. To initiate economic pressure on a country with the sole purpose being sending the country into anarchy to overthrow the current regime is ludicrous at best and catastrophic at worst.

So, here we are. We shouldn't invade Iran without very, very good reason, Israel likely won't take military action against Iran because they simply cannot take on the entire Middle East and would likely spark another world war, and an economic boycott of Iran with the goal of inciting a revolution is not a very good idea. What should we do? Well, maybe we sit down with Israel and suggest they cool down a bit, maybe we initiate some economic sanctions against Iran with the hope of pressuring them into a policy change, or maybe we decide that there isn't anything out there currently that warrants action. I don't have all the details, nor do I pretend to. Nor does Mr. O'Reilly.

And that's "The CounterPoints Memo."