O'Reilly: "[T]en years ago, nobody [had] even heard" of Iraq
SUMMARY: Despite widespread reports of the Taliban's resurgence in Afghanistan, Bill O'Reilly baselessly claimed that it is a "myth" that "Afghanistan's going backwards" and declared that "the Bush administration has won a victory in Afghanistan." O'Reilly also asserted that "10 years ago, nobody [had] even heard of" Iraq; in fact, the United States led a coalition against Iraq in Operation Desert Storm in 1991.
On the October 23 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly presented viewers with a host of misinformation regarding Iraq and Afghanistan. In addition to baselessly claiming that "the Bush administration has won a victory in Afghanistan," O'Reilly also asserted that "10 years ago, nobody [had] even heard of" Iraq, despite the fact that the United States led a coalition against Iraq in Operation Desert Storm in 1991. O'Reilly further stated that while most of the problems in Iraq are "the Iraqis' fault" because they "are the ones that are killing each other," what is "America's fault, the Bush administration's fault" is that "[w]e thought ... [w]e were going to be greeted with flags, as conquerors." Vice President Dick Cheney famously predicted U.S. troops would be greeted in Iraq as "liberators," not "conquerors." Additionally, O'Reilly's guest, Fox News political analyst and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich (R-GA), baselessly asserted that support for "unilateral withdrawal" of U.S. troops in Iraq, which Gingrich attributed to House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi (CA) and Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean, "would get about 25 percent of the vote." In fact, polling has consistently shown that a majority of Americans favor a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq, the position Dean and Pelosi favor.
O'Reilly also claimed during the program that he was "not a partisan as far as telling anybody who to vote for. I think you're [his viewers] smart enough to know who to vote for." As Media Matters for America has noted, O'Reilly has suggested that both North Korea and Iran "want[] to influence the November election" and want Americans to "vote in the Democrats."
During a discussion with Sarah Sewall, director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, O'Reilly claimed that "we were successful in Afghanistan"; that it is "a myth" that "Afghanistan's going backwards," as Sewall claimed; that "[t]here's always going to be a Taliban insurrection" in Afghanistan; that "[e]very military analyst working for our team says most of that country is pacified"; and that "[o]ur information is that there's no danger at all of the Taliban reclaiming that country, none. They'll be annoying. There'll be guerrilla warfare." When Sewall tried to argue otherwise, O'Reilly declared her to be "just parroting the left-wing line that America doesn't know what its doing." Sewall replied: "I'm parroting conversations with commanders who are in uniform serving bravely in Afghanistan."
In fact, as the Associated Press reported October 2, "Afghanistan is suffering its heaviest insurgent attacks since a U.S.-led military force toppled the Taliban in late 2001 for harboring al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden." According to the AP casualty count, which is "based on reports from U.S., NATO and Afghan officials, at least 2,800 people have been killed nationwide so far this year," making this year, as ABC News reported "the bloodiest fighting" in Afghanistan "since the Taliban was toppled in 2001." Further, according to CBS News, Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai warned in June that "[s]ecurity forces battling the biggest rise in Taliban violence in years will be bolstered by new recruits from local tribes." Additionally, as CBS reported, Afghanistan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak characterized the increase in violence, notably in southern Afghanistan, as an "all-out Taliban push." ABC News reported on October 23 that Taliban leader Mullah Omar promised to increase violence in the "coming months":
Marking Islam's holiest day with a message to his followers, Mullah Omar warned that the Taliban's campaign would become "more forceful and organized" in the coming months, and would eventually drive the NATO-led coalition from Afghanistan.
"Do not be deceived by the enemy's hollow and unworthy propaganda," he wrote in his Eid ul-Fitr message, explaining that American forces in Afghanistan had already "been faced with defeat."
Further, contrary to O'Reilly's claim that "there's no danger at all of the Taliban reclaiming that country, none," Gen. David Richards, NATO's commanding officer in Afghanistan, who claims the situation in southern Afghanistan is stabilized, warned that Afghanistan was at a "tipping point," and that "If we collectively ... do not exploit this winter to start achieving concrete and visible improvement, then some 70% of Afghans could switch sides" and support the Taliban.
While Gingrich baselessly suggested that only 25 percent of the public would support Pelosi and Dean's plan for Iraq, a Pew public opinion poll conducted September 21-October 4, the most recent poll available on the issue, found that 53 percent of respondents favored a timetable for troop withdrawal from Iraq. Thirty-nine percent felt that the United States "should not" set a timetable.
From the October 23 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor:
O'REILLY: See, I'm not a partisan as far as telling anybody who to vote for. I think you're smart enough to know who to vote for. But I'm looking at the unintended consequences. And this is all about Iraq.
Isn't it interesting that Iraq now -- this Muslim country that 10 years ago nobody even heard of, all right, is now impacting on how we live in America.
GINGRICH: Right.
O'REILLY: Because again, if Iraq had been pacified the way Afghanistan is, if it had been a successful military campaign, Bush would -- 60 percent. There would be no dissatisfaction because the economy's pretty good --
GINGRICH: Right.
O'REILLY: -- everything's rolling along. But Iraq is now influencing how we live here.
GINGRICH: You know, I watched this as somebody who used to plan elections. And if you had said to me the Dow's going to break 12,000, we're going to set records in the stock market, people are going to have more money in their savings, more money in their pension plan, we're going to see gasoline drop back down by about a dollar a gallon decline in price, I would have said that's a pretty good -- I'd like to have those last two or three weeks to campaign in.
But you're right. Wars are about performance. The American people will support fighting if necessary. They are very concerned. The majority do not want to withdraw.
I mean, the truth is, in a straight up-and-down vote, the Nancy Pelosi-Howard Dean unilateral withdrawal argument would get about 25 percent of the vote. But people don't want to just stay the course. They don't want to be told --
O'REILLY: Right.
GINGRICH: -- we're not going to change.
[...]
O'REILLY: OK. And I agree with that. But it is the Iraqis' fault. The Iraqis are the ones that are killing each other. The Iraqi militias in the south have allied themselves with Iran. The Iraqis are harboring Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda couldn't exist in the country without Iraqi complicity.
So it is the Iraqis' fault. And to give them a pass is ridiculous. Now --
SEWALL: Well, I haven't given them a pass. In January --
O'REILLY: -- our fault is we didn't anticipate the fact -- our fault is, America's fault, the Bush administration's fault is we didn't anticipate that the Iraqis wouldn't step up. We thought they would, remember? We were going to be greeted with flags, as conquerors.
[...]
O'REILLY: No, I think that's vital. But look, we were successful in Afghanistan. And nobody thought --
SEWALL: Well, the jury's still out on Afghanistan, though.
O'REILLY: -- we would overthrow the Taliban in that way. So we were successful.
SEWALL: Unfortunately, Afghanistan's going backwards --
O'REILLY: That's a myth.
SEWALL: -- which I think speaks --
O'REILLY: That's a myth.
SEWALL: -- to part of the problem with the focus of effort on Iraq. We risk losing the progress that had been made in Afghanistan.
O'REILLY: Now you're just -- that's not true. There's always going to be a Taliban insurrection. As long as they have mountain --
SEWALL: It is true.
O'REILLY: No, it's not. Every military analyst working for our team says most of that country is pacified.
SEWALL: Maybe you should be talking to the people on the ground, then.
O'REILLY: I talk to everybody, Professor.
SEWALL: Because they're concerned about the situation there.
O'REILLY: You're just parroting the left-wing line that America doesn't know what it's doing. It's bull.
SEWALL: I'm parroting conversations with commanders who are in uniform serving bravely in Afghanistan.
O'REILLY: All right, so have I. And our information is that there's no danger at all of the Taliban reclaiming that country, none. They'll be annoying. There'll be guerrilla warfare. It will not happen, and I believe that. Final question for you.
SEWALL: Well, I assume then that you're discounting the views of the British commander of the new NATO force who's quite concerned about the direction.
O'REILLY: Everybody's concerned --
SEWALL: And I think the point is that we need to --
O'REILLY: -- nobody thinks the Taliban's going to win.
SEWALL: -- have a different strategy in Afghanistan also.
O'REILLY: OK, last question.
SEWALL: There are very serious issues.
O'REILLY: The Bush administration has won a victory in Afghanistan, I believe. And they've also decimated Al Qaeda. So they've got two wins and a loss. A loss, not means that it can't not turn out. But it's certainly, as you put it, chaotic in Iraq.
So if we do change tactics, and if we don't do anything impulsive, which would lead to disaster, in my opinion, because Iran would move into that gulf, there is still a possibility we can come out of this in a good way. I'll give you the last word.
The sad thing is that much of his audience probably never did hear of Iraq until after 9/11. They might have vague memories of Saddam from the early 1990's, but that's about it. Actually, a lot of people probably never heard of the word loofah until October 13th, 2004, which is the day the story about Bill O'Reilly and Andrea Mackris broke.
THANK YOU. njguy93@yahoo.com
Until the US put Iraq on the map (by invading them)... Hell, the Iraqis didn't have any real identity.
What a bunch of jingoistic crap. BO in fine form.
Right... all except for catching public enemy number one. Kind of like Roe v. Wade. If you do away with it...then what're your minions to do?
why don't you tell us what he could have possibly meant by that comment. sounds pretty clear. nobody heard of iraq 10 years ago. even going beyond the gulf war in 1991, iraq fought a nine year war with iran in the eighties, with huge casualties on both sides. if you caught the news on occasionly you heard about it. of course, you could be right. o'reilly could have meant his [and limbaugh's, etc...] audience. they are incapable of any independent thought of their own, and the only truth they know is the latest thing they're told to believe.
Ahh sorry the fact that Afghanistan is headed down a slippery slope is not a myth, definitely not a sucess. Opium production is at all time high, which funds the Taleban. Corruption is rampant, which is why the Taleban is popular in some areas. BBC noted how drivers have to pay a bribe at every checkpoint manned by Afghan soldiers. How the Taleban can be popular is beyond me. They have committed some of the most vile acts against citizens for minor infractions of 7th century law. I believe they hate women more than the US.
He provide many examples of misinformation:
1. He misrepresented Pelosi and Dean's position on a timetable.
2. He is claiming "victory" in Afghanistan despite the fact that attacks are on the rise.
3. He seems to think no one knew about Iraq more than 10 years ago. Only Toby Keith is ignorant enough to fit in that category.
4. He says he is not partisan, but it can be easily argued that he invariably supports Republicans and their causes.
You are right that it is not criminal. It must feel good to be right about something. Although I don't see where anyone was arguing that.
He's only not a criminal by the court declaration and lots of spending money to pacify the victim of his sexual harassment.
Please explain how Robert Byrd is related to OLielly?
From the Wikipedia artcile on Senator Byrd: Byrd's use of [the 'n' word] created immediate controversy, When asked about it, Byrd apologized for the language: " 'I apologize for the characterization I used on this program,' he said. 'The phrase dates back to my boyhood and has no place in today's society. [...] 'In my attempt to articulate strongly held feelings, I may have offended people.' " In other words, he admitted (albeit indirectly) that he made a mistake and apologized. Good luck finding any recent examples of Bill-O doing any such thing!
[link to en.wikipedia.org]
That is almost as pathetic as your weak attempt to change the topic. Your bridge is calling troll
Plain & Simple. I feel sorry for all of the students who were taught by this imbecile. As a former history teacher, O'Reilly doesn't get a pass on this. If he'd stop for once and let his brain catch up with his lips, his listeners would be better served.
He and you Dave, will say or do, anything to advance your cause regardless of the truth. What does is say about some people, when they're willing to follow an ignorant man right off the cliff?
"So herr dubyah misspoke, it's not a crime is it? " ~Daveblaze
Noticed the unhinged and anti-American reich-wing have to divert the topic (Senator Byrd?!?!!?). ROFL. Blaze is always blazing the trail for the moron RW nation.
Hey Bull, try thinking back to fifteen years ago . . . we had just finished a WAR in that selfsame country "nobody even heard of" . . . though I'm sure the families of the 376 US servicepersons who lost their lives in that war knew where it was . . .
And Bull, you really oughta get out of your studio sometime:
O'REILLY: . . . You're just parroting the left-wing line that America doesn't know what its doing. It's bull.
SEWALL: I'm parroting conversations with commanders who are in uniform serving bravely in Afghanistan.
The First Gulf War (15 years ago) was right after a 10 year war with Iran in which the US militarily supported guess who.
You would really have to go back about 25-30 years before no one heard of Iraq...Again, not counting Toby Keith who is still somewhat baffled by the difference between Iran and Iraq.
It was actually Alan Jackson who wasn't sure about the difference between Iraq and Iran, if you're referring to song lyrics. :)
My apologies to Toby. Alan is the proud imbecile I was referring to.
Thanks for the correction.
Such as Donald Rumsfeld, yeah THAT Rumsfeld, who visited Saddam twice.
Or North that took the fall for the US's secret sales of weapons to iran through south america. All under a goverment that supported Saddam during his aggressions against Iran and the genocide against Kurds and Iraqis.
Even Saddams invasion of Kuwait was not enough to shake the support of then president Bush (sr) wo proclimed it as a regional issue and none of our buisiness.
But Bill does show an affliction that seems farspread in the US: forgetting the uncomfortable past. He simply forgets about what those he defends today, did back then. That makes everything so much easier.
"Every military analyst working for our team..."
That says it all really. He's only listening to people on the Fox News payroll. Idiot.
.... originally referred to the killing of every tenth person, a punishment used in the Roman army for mutinous legions.
THEN:
"CIA intelligence at the time of invasion suggested that Al Qaeda was about 5,000 strong in Afghanistan."
NOW:
"Far from being crippled by the U.S.-led war on terror, al-Qaida has more than 18,000 potential terrorists scattered around the world and the war in Iraq is swelling its ranks, a report said Tuesday. Estimates of the number of people who went through Al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan have ranged as high as 120,000. Low-end estimates are still in the 70,000-80,000 range."
NEW RIGHTWING MEDIA DEFINITION of "decimated": Increased tenfold.
someone invading a country and the citizens taking up arms to vanquish the invader? It has happened time again throughout the world. Guess what, it is happening again. This new country, Iraq, has been invaded about three times a century and still remains Iraq. These "Iraqi terrorists" are fighting for their Homeland. Doesn't anyone in TV or radio get it, these people are pissed off at us and have our troops in a shooting barrel. As an above post has noted, their defense of their Homeland is growing. No matter how terrible we think these people might be, they have a MISSION which is not ACCOMPLISHED.
I suspect Donald Rumsfeld had heard of Iraq when he was captured in that classic photo with Saddam Hussein. Righty commentators everywhere have odd memories. The situation in Afganistan is becoming a problem for Canada's right- leaning Prime Minister, called a mess he unwittingly inherited from a previous 'liberal' government. The irony is, as Leader of the Opposition previous to his election, he argued for sending Canadian soldiers to Iraq (which Canada did not). The right correctly knows it's easier to blame things than fix them
For the sake of irony I like Bill. On any other level I think he's a blithering idiot.
Once again O'Reilly proves he is an airhead. The fact that our very own identity began there makes Bill sound as ignorant as he is. The Sumerian society gave humanity many things to build upon from agriculture and accounting to justice and writing. The site of the oldest documented civilization on the planet and we have destroyed it. Maybe Bill has never heard of Mesopotamia, what a putz. With such rich history of humankind not to mention the first Gulf War, O'Reilly once again proves he doesn't have much knowledge of world history but he can get away with anything he wants on Fox.
"O'Reilly further stated that while most of the problems in Iraq are "the Iraqis' fault" because they "are the ones that are killing each other," what is "America's fault, the Bush administration's fault" is that "[w]e thought ... [w]e were going to be greeted with flags, as conquerors."
Okay, let me get this straight. Before we invaded, in 2002 and 2003, Sunnis were not killing Shiites and Shiites were not killing Sunnis. They lived in mixed neighborhoods and intermarried on a regular basis.
Their country was invaded, and now they are killing each other.
How can you come to any conclusion besides blaming the US invasion, an idea conceived by the Bush Administration, for the bloodshed in Iraq?
It is the Bush Administration's fault that they thought that we would be welcomed with flowers! It is absolutely insane to have overestimated the likelihood of our success, and that's exactly what they did.
Because the Bush Administration invaded a country without justification and without legitimacy, and because they did not do that invasion well, with thoughtful planning, Sunnis and Shiites are killing each other. It is all the fault of the Bush Administration. All of it.
It's true that the administration's poorly advised, conceived, planned, and executed invasion of Iraq opened the door for the current violence between Sunnis and Shiites. However, the causes of the violence between the two Islamic groups goes deeper than that. It's roots lie in the different interpretations of the Koran and Hadith, and is therefore religious in origin.
Not only that, but Saddam - having been raised Sunni - and his regime did not exactly treat Shiites as equals. In the early '90s the Shiites staged a rebellion against the regime, which failed miserably because our government failed to support their uprising.
In any event, it's a bit of an oversimplification to say that Sunni and Shiite Muslims are killing each other in Iraq because of our invasion. Otherwise, I agree with you.
In 1996, you didn't hear about Iraq often. Clinton had Saddam contained, there weren't 150,000 US troops over there being killed at a rate of ~90/month, Iraqis weren't blowing each other up on a daily basis, and Desert Storm trading cards were hard to come by. The average American probably couldn't pick out Iraq on a map of Iraq.
Thanks for the perspective, Bill.
Oh, and check out "The Big Lebowski" when you get a chance.
Maybe it was a mistake, but he isn't right. The first Gulf War was a big deal. Anyone born before 1980 would have been well aware of it. Who could forget Norman Schwartzkof or the "luckiest man in Iraq" video? Also, anyone born before 1965 would remember the Iraq/Iran war, because it was in the news quite a bit during the Iran hostage crisis. In fact, when one of the hostages was asked for a statement on their return, he said "Buy Iraqi war bonds."
I'm surprised Newt didn't correct him. Isn't Newt some kind of "history" professor on the side? I guess he had his political-hack hat on and didn't dare correct his fellow hack.
was that 10 years ago, 1996, Iraq was being dealt with in such a way that it was not front page news, not a topic of conversation, hundreds of people weren't being killed daily there, and most Americans probably could not point it out on a map. Not that they could today, either.
He said that "no one had even heard of " Iraq. That's not quite the same as saying it wasn't front page news. You could also say that 10 years ago, North Korea wasn't front page news, but could you claim that no one had even heard of it? I know he's just being rhetorical, but, since he claims to be a journalist, he should use more precise language.
But I do know one thing:
O'Reilly definitely does NOT abide.
repeated references to Saddam and the first gulf war, which according to Bill no one had ever heard about at that time.
is nobody, since he surely must have heard of Iraq when he met face-to-face with Saddam to help him out with his little war against Iran.
Iraq has WMD's. Saddam bought yellow cake from Niger. We will be greated as liberators. The war will be over in just a few weeks. Democracy will spread throughout the Middle East. Mission Accomplished. Major combat operations are over. Iraq helps Al-Qaïda. Saddam was a dangerous dictator. We have to fight them over there so they won't attack us here. Tax cuts help us all. The economy is doing great. The deficit is not a problem. The outcome of Iraq will determine the result of the war on terror. Afghanistan is pacified. We will prevail. Gays are a threat to the family. Abortion is murder. God is behind us.
Iraq has WMD's. Saddam bought yellow cake from Niger. We will be greeted as liberators. The war will be over in just a few weeks. Democracy will spread throughout the Middle East. Mission Accomplished. Major combat operations are over. Iraq helps Al-Qaïda. Saddam was a dangerous dictator. We have to fight them over there so they won't attack us here. Tax cuts help us all. The economy is doing great. The deficit is not a problem. The outcome of Iraq will determine the result of the war on terror. Afghanistan is pacified. We will prevail. Gays are a threat to the family. Abortion is murder. God is behind us.
... as stable and under control and the Taliban will NEVER AGAIN take any active role ...
... then the next question/statement is obvious: WE CAN LEAVE, COME HOME, MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. Right, Bill?
Uh, oh, no, it's not THAT stable ... uh, don't be hasty ... uh, even though I make bombastic statements with certainty, that doesn't mean we can just LEAVE ... Uh uh uh ...
Idiot. Dangerous idiot, MISINFORMING his sheep, and willing the further slaughter of our soldiers FOR NO REASON except partisan power.
Sometimes I really think that this is a race to win the most dumbest person award in the whole universe; and the top nominees are Rush, BUSH, and O'Reilly. Guess O'Reilly was sleeping during the first Gulf war. I hope he should do his research before openning his mouth. Man what a dumb ass guy. Sorry, what a dumb guy as I don't want to insult an ass.
O'REILLY: "A loss, not means that it can't not turn out."
Head... spinning...
What happened to the Soviet Army in Afghanistan. In fact, there are some historians who think the Afghan war contributed greatly to the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Nato forces may face a similar challenge in that country. I'm not saying they can't win, but it would behoove them to take it a little more seriously than the Bush administration did.
Billo wakes up every morning and thinks it's the same day again, only he gets to say things completely differently, and nobody will notice.
Well, 10 years ago, the entire nation was freaking out about soemthing else as we bombed Iraq weekly and starved them of medicines. This is just more proof that TV folk have very short attention spans. O'Reilly probably does believe that nothing exists unless the "news" media is obsessing over it. Them TV folk do live in their own little dream worlds, not the real one.