For some reason, Bill O’Reilly thought he and producer Jesse Watters would look better if they revisited the asinine hit job on Cornell University that got Watters kicked off campus.
You may recall that last week, The O’Reilly Factor sent attack dog Watters to Cornell to badger and belittle students over the fact that professors disproportionately donate to Democratic candidates. Before he got kicked out, Watters asked such "penetrating" questions as “Do the professors pass around doobies in class?” and “Do the teachers ever burn incense in class?”
When O’Reilly has been confronted about Watters’ hit jobs in the past, O’Reilly has criticized his critics for taking them too seriously. Last month, he lectured a Muslim who took exception to Watters’ mockery of the Muslim community in Dearborn, Michigan by arguing it was “good-natured satire.” Similarly after a group of Bennington, Vermont high school students eviscerated the journalistic ethics of another “Watters World” smear piece on their town, O’Reilly dismissed them by saying, “I don’t know if they and their instructors quite understand the satiric element.”
But after O’Reilly was called out for “shoddy journalism” by the Cornell student paper, all of a sudden, he wanted to present Watters World as serious journalism.
According to O'Reilly, the student newspaper wrote:
There is no question that the Fox News segment clearly sought to embarrass through its cuts to cultural clips and witless questions. …Yet the university’s response to the piece was far more embarrassing than reporter Jesse Watters’ shoddy journalism techniques.
Early in this segment, O’Reilly claimed that the original segment “revealed that Cornell University is overwhelmingly liberal.”
After reading the quote from the student paper, O’Reilly said, “Shoddy journalism techniques? Take a look.” And then, as if Jon Stewart had written the clip for him, we saw Watters ask a student, “Have the professors ever told you to make love, not war?” She laughed at the stupidity of the question.
“All you did was ask questions!” O’Reilly said to Watters, back in the studio. “How’s that shoddy journalism?” O’Reilly said he was “outraged” that Cornell kicked Watters out. “We’re asking legitimate questions!”
“I didn’t embarrass the students. They did that for themselves,” Watters said.
Au contraire. I think there's no doubt it was Watters who came out looking like a jerk. Again.
Watch it below, from the November 2 The O’Reilly Factor.
“Does it bother you that you work for a man who once cheated on his then-wife, and sent a private investigator to spy on her, and harass her in front of the world? Are you really proud to work for such person? Or is the money more important than your morals?”
After the encounter post it on YouTube for all the masses to see.
Yep, all Jesse did was ask questions. I have one for O’Reilly then.
Yes or no. Did you enjoy beating your wife? Great ‘journalism’ eh? I’m just ask’n. ;^)
http://tinyurl.com/7ch8brw
Totally serious textbook journalism courtesy of “The Factor.” ;^)