CNN discussed the reporting by Mother Jones that likens Bill O'Reilly's tales of his war reporting to Brian Williams.
The article, which I've discussed here and which O'Reilly has since denounced as "a piece of garbage" compares many O'Reilly statements about his war correspondent days with evidence of embellishments.
On CNN, media critic Brian Stelter said he had wondered whether, in the wake of the Brian Williams scandal, other news hosts would be subjected to the same level of scrutiny. "Now the answer is yes," Stelter said. Stelter called O'Reilly the Williams of cable news, meaning that he has the highest ratings of his milieu. "He is the biggest, in some ways, target and the most important, in some ways, deserving of scrutiny. So this story is significant."
Stelter seemed to praise O'Reilly for "being very blunt" in his response and "not letting this story snowball." However, that may not be enough to stop it. "But listen," Stelter continued, "It's already trending on Facebook and Twitter. ...If there's discrepancies between what he's saying now, that could hurt him further."
I've already posted about what I see as a discrepancy between what O'Reilly is saying now and what he has previously said.
But if there's anything that Fox News excels at, it's promoting falsehoods and getting away with it.
Watch the discussion below, from the February 19 CNN Tonight.
Kurtz looks to be hanging BOR’s defense on “semantics” and “O’Reilly’s shorthand use of the Falklands”. I could be wrong but my guess is that BOR will have to say something about it on tonight’s show.
And now to enjoy my afternoon off and NOT think about BOR and his spin/lies, etc. I don’t know how you NHs do it – too much FOX “news” and its talking heads makes me ill. :-]
Direct link to Kurtz’s piece defending BOR…
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/02/20/oreilly-denounces-mother-jones-story-on-his-war-reporting/
Btw, I keep seeing online right-wingers attempting to defend BOR by throwing shade on MJ and David Corn with remarks to the effect that no one pays any attention to MJ and Corn; that no one reads them; that MJ magazine is only read when people want to learn stuff about marijuana. LOL!
Apparently, these bozos have forgotten that MJ and Corn were the reason that Americans found out about Romney’s 47% remarks. They were the ones to reveal just how much disdain and disregard that Romney has for his fellow Americans. I’ve heard some who have said that Romney’s 47% remarks really woke up a lot of Americans to his true nature and to just what kind of President he would make — that the revelation of his remarks just might have been a factor in getting more folks out to the polls to vote for Obama.
And, if I’m not mistaken, I’m pretty sure that David Corn won a Polk for his work in the story. You know, a Polk, the award that BOR deceptively made a claim about (and I say deceptively because “Inside Edition” won the Polk after BOR had left the show).
A piece on the matter from Wonkette (written as only Wonkette can do). It seems that now, Howard Kurtz, a FOX “news” colleague of BOR’s, has decided to come to his defense…
http://wonkette.com/576937/breaking-bill-oreilly-has-possibly-lied-about-a-few-things
And a little light reading just to refresh our memories…
http://www.bostonmagazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/OReilly3.pdf
