Ted Koppel visited The O’Reilly Factor last night where he discussed the reasons he thinks opinionated cable news is not good for the country. Koppel gently but firmly confronted Bill O’Reilly on his own tactics that Koppel acknowledged were good for business but, he seemed to think, not much else. As the segment ended, O’Reilly said, “I still think I’m doing something noble.” And Koppel declined to respond.

The interview arose out of an editorial that Koppel wrote in the Washington Post in which he criticized cable news and, apparently, Bill O’Reilly, in particular. O’Reilly introduced the segment by saying, “The big mistake Mr. Koppel is making is putting me, your humble correspondent, in that category of speaking to the choir. I don’t. You know it. I had to convince Mr. Koppel of that.”

Let’s just say I don’t think Koppel was convinced. He said he didn’t have “a beef” with O’Reilly. But, Koppel added, he did find him “Sometimes a little too bold, sometimes a little too fresh, sometimes a little too intolerant of allowing people to complete an answer… It offends me when you’re rude, when you ride over people, as you have a tendency to do.”

O’Reilly said he only does it when someone “filibuster(s) or when they lie,” and doesn’t do it when somebody is “sincerely trying to answer my question.” Well, unless you’re Jeremy Glick. Or Jehmu Greene. And I’d love to see O’Reilly explain to Koppel his over-the-top attacks on abortion doctor George Tiller.

O’Reilly put forth the Fox News canard that most of Fox is unbiased reporting. “This is a news agency here,” he said, supposedly distinguishing it from MSNBC.

Koppel made it clear he wasn’t buying that. But rather than wade into the weeds, he said the overall partisanship on cable has “made it difficult, if not impossible, for decent men and women in Congress, on Capitol Hill, to reach across the aisle and find compromise. And if we can’t do that, Bill, we’re gonna be – and we have been, I think, for the last few years – in a terrible situation in this country where, politically, we can’t make deals any more.”

O’Reilly seemed more interested in defending himself and Fox than in considering its effects on American society. He said it’s “impossible” for a news network to be “on top” for so long if they have an "inferior product." He continued, “So therefore, I want you to re-evaluate our network, watch it a little bit more, and we’ll talk in about a year.”

Koppel did not indicate he’d agree to that. He ended by saying,“It’s a business and it’s operating as a business and once upon a time, you and I actually thought journalism was a calling.”

“But I still think that I’m doing something noble,” O’Reilly insisted.

Koppel didn’t say anything further.

Then they both laughed at that implication.