On The O’Reilly Factor last night, Bill O’Reilly devoted an entire segment to attacking Michele Bachmann. Fox and O’Reilly defenders will surely point to that as proof of his independence. But it’s really more an example of the GOP civil war that has been playing out on the Fox News airwaves lately. Because the gist of O’Reilly’s contention was that Bachmann’s crazy accusations against Obama work undermine the more substantive vilification O’Reilly prefers.
In case you missed it, Bachmann drummed up some now-familiar attacks on President Obama’s lavishness which she then refused to defend to CNN. She also declined to discuss them on The Factor. Ordinarily, a refusal like that would earn someone a visit from ambush producer Jesse Watters but, probably because Bachmann has an “R” after her name, she was merely censured.
“This would be much ado about nothing if not for the fact that trivial attacks on President Obama are obscuring serious problems in this country,” O’Reilly said. While he acknowledged that Obama lives well at the White House, he also noted that President George W. Bush had a bigger White House budget. “Michele Bachmann made a mistake pursuing” what O’Reilly called a “trivial pursuit.”
“Mr. Obama is entitled to protection, convenience and comfort as he runs the nation,” O’Reilly continued. “Congresswoman Bachmann and all opponents of Mr. Obama should zero in on what’s really important: the president’s failure to deal with out-of-control spending. And his core belief that America’s not a fair country. That’s what’s important. Not who’s walking the presidential dog. By the way, that’s the gardener who walks the dog – and he’s always walked the dogs! And how many movies the Obamas watch.”
O’Reilly’s making sense here on a lot of levels, I think. But then he went on to tell partisans on both sides “to cut the nonsense and look at things clearly.” He added, “We’ve got huge problems in America and the president’s directly responsible for some of those problems. He’s not willing to compromise, he doesn’t see the big economic picture and he’s way too far left for a commander-in-chief. That’s what we should be focusing on… Michele Bachmann is playing small ball with the president. Can’t back up her criticism and actually trivializes a huge problem – irresponsible spending by the federal government. Two words: not good.”
There’s only problem, though. O’Reilly needs to follow his own advice. That is, unless he thinks that ambushing President Obama’s immigrant uncle or obsessing over Sandra Fluke’s support for contraception or Gov. Lincoln Chafee's holiday (not "Christmas") tree is focusing on what’s important.
Video below via Mediaite.
O'Reilly Goes After Bachmann For 'Lavish White House' Critique: 'Playing Small Ball,' 'Can't Back Up Her Criticism'
Congresswoman Michele Bachmann was invited to sit down with Bill O'Reilly tonight to talk about her controversial remarks regarding how American taxpayers are paying for a lavish White House lifestyle, but O'Reilly explained that Bachmann didn't want to come on. Instead, O'Reilly spent the segment essentially tearing down Bachmann's assertions...
http://nation.foxnews.com/robert-menendez/2013/03/05/did-hooker-lie-robert-menendez-scandal
Even in the article, they admit that DC is so hot to push this that he didn’t even identify the right hooker as the one that fessed up. Here’s a couple quick Google examples of that rag and their defenders keeping it up in the last 24 hours:
http://dailycaller.com/2013/03/21/jack-abramoff-obama-should-cut-off-menendezs-head-over-donor-scandal/
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/brian-walsh/2013/03/20/democrats-are-ignoring-the-growing-bob-menendez-ethics-scandal
Go get ‘em, Bill- Oh wait, I forgot that when we play the “eat our own to look fair” card, we only go after the people who’s numbers scream almost no chance in 2014.