Mark Twain said "a lie can travel halfway around the world." That was before the internet and Fox News which, thanks to Bill O'Reilly, is aiding and abetting lies that eventually become part of the ugly and false right wing narrative that divides Americans into opposing camps. This divisiveness is underscored in the type of rhetoric, advanced by Fox News and the right wing media world, which fosters hatred of "illegal immigrants" who, according to those who promote hate, are getting benefits they don't deserve. Bill O'Reilly advanced this message in his recent conversation with Adam Carolla, during which they agreed that folks wouldn't starve without food stamp. O'Reilly started the food stamp conversation by claiming that the Obama administration is working to allow undocumented immigrants to receive food stamps. As with so much of what O'Reilly says, it's a great, big, fat, whopping lie.

Bill said that "apparently there have been extensive conversations between the Obama administration and the government of Mexico about how to get food stamps, paid for by Carolla, and myself and you guys watching, to illegal aliens coming across the border." After tossing out that bombshell, O'Reilly and Carolla speculated that this is being done to pander to the Latino community who, according to O'Reilly, don't distinguish between illegal and legal when it comes to getting "largesse" for their community.

This, as documented by the Fox News website that O'Reilly apparently doesn't read, is just NOT TRUE.  According to Fox News.com, the Obama administration has met with Mexican officials to "discuss enrollment in food stamps" for "legal" non-citizens. In other words, those with green cards and other statuses deemed eligible for the program. As noted in the article, "Those eligible for the program include Mexican Americans, Mexican nationals and migrant communities in the United States." The meetings began during the Bush administration."

According to information from the Department of Agriculture, "USDA and the government of Mexico have entered into a partnership to help educate eligible Mexican nationals living in theUnited States about available nutrition assistance.Mexico will help disseminate this information through its embassy and network of approximately 50 consular offices."

Moreover, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack has stated that "illegal immigrants are not eligible for food stamps."

But you didn't hear this from O'Reilly who is dead wrong when he says that the Obama administration is trying to give food stamps to "illegals." But thanks to his lie, his bigoted audience, who take his word on faith alone, will have their bigotry reinforced with the  belief that these evil "illegals" will be getting food stamps when the reality is that, as Jon Stewart says, O'Reilly is "full of shit."

On the loofah scale (1 loofah if he's only slightly off base; 2 loofahs if the information isn't totally conclusive; loofahs on fire if the comment is batshit crazy) this gets Five Great, Big, Bold, Fresh, Flaming Loofahs!