O'Reilly to "race hustlers" and "race-baiters": "[T]he gloves are off"
SUMMARY: Asserting that "millions of Americans of all colors are fed up with race-baiters and accusations of racism," Bill O'Reilly identified those he deemed to be "race hustlers" and "race-baiters" -- among them Media Matters for America -- and declared: "You better watch it. We got your number. And the gloves are off."
During the April 7 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, discussing what he claimed to be the "white backlash against Reverend [Jeremiah] Wright and racist accusations," host Bill O'Reilly asserted that "millions of Americans of all colors are fed up with race-baiters and accusations of racism. This vile stuff has been going on far too long. And now with the Wright controversy, critical mass has been reached." O'Reilly then identified those he deemed to be "race hustlers" and "race-baiters" and declared: "You better watch it. We got your number. And the gloves are off." Among those he named was Media Matters for America, about which he stated: "The hateful far-left Media Matters website has branded as racist the following: Alan Colmes, John Gibson, Glenn Beck, Michelle Malkin, Neil Cavuto, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh and Fred Barnes among others." O'Reilly later added: "The result of all this garbage is that millions of white Americans will no longer even think about discussing race with blacks."
O'Reilly also attacked Eric Deggans, media critic at the St. Petersburg Times, asserting: "Deggans takes delight in branding people racist. Senator Joseph McCarthy would love this guy." O'Reilly added: "Secondly, African-Americans should realize that this stuff drives good people away from constructive dialogue that might advance racial harmony in America. The race baiters and profiteers actually hurt minorities by inhibiting sincere discussion." Deggans responded to O'Reilly in an April 8 item at The Huffington Post, headlined "My Proudest Moment as a Pundit: Bill O'Reilly Calls Me a Race Baiter," in which he wrote: "When a master at manipulating race-based tension calls you out, you must be doing something right."
During the March 25 edition of his Fox News program, O'Reilly called Media Matters an "awful, despicable ... outfit" and said: "[T]alk about anti-Americanism. I mean, the Media Matters ... these are fascists. They're dishonest people." Likewise, referring to Media Matters, O'Reilly recently asserted: "Any of the presidential candidates who can deport those swine -- I'm voting for them."
From the April 7 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor:
O'REILLY: Hi, I'm Bill O'Reilly. Thank you for watching us tonight. The white backlash against Reverend Wright and racist accusations -- that is the subject of this evening's "Talking Points Memo."
As we've been reporting, millions of Americans of all colors are fed up with race-baiters and accusations of racism. This vile stuff has been going on far too long. And now with the Wright controversy, critical mass has been reached.
Here is a partial list of people that Jesse Jackson's organizations have labeled racist. President Bush, President Bush the elder, President Reagan, Newt Gingrich, Don Imus, Trent Lott, Gary Hart, and Jeb Bush.
The hateful far-left Media Matters website has branded as racist the following: Alan Colmes, John Gibson, Glenn Beck, Michelle Malkin, Neil Cavuto, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Fred Barnes, among others.
Liberal icon Senator Joe Biden and Geraldine Ferraro have both been branded racist. Comedian Bill Maher was called racist by his former girlfriend Nancy Johnson, who sued him, and the list goes on and on.
The result of all this garbage is that millions of white Americans will no longer even think about discussing race with blacks. It is far too dangerous. Any slip of the tongue can lead to big trouble.
One of the biggest race-baiters in the country writes for the St. Petersburg Times newspaper. Eric Deggans also serves as the chairman of the Black Journalist Media Monitoring Committee. Deggans takes delight in branding people racist. Senator Joseph McCarthy would love this guy.
So what should be done? Well, full exposure of the race-baiters is number one. They will be challenged here.
Secondly, African-Americans should realize that this stuff drives good people away from constructive dialogue that might advance racial harmony in America. The race-baiters and the profiteers actually hurt minorities by inhibiting sincere discussion. If you've watched The Factor over the years, you know we have a great guest list filled with smart Americans of all colors and ethnicities. We have a respectful relationship with Al Sharpton. We have introduced the country to great minds like Juan Williams and Dr. Marc Lamont Hill.
We'll continue to do that in the no-spin zone because no-spin people come in all colors. But you race hustlers out there, you race-baiters: You better watch it. We got your number. And the gloves are off. And that's the "Memo."
This was great, I caught part of this. For all of his "the gloves are off' tough-talk, BilldO's position for the rest of the show seemed to be that he was done talking about race because he kept getting in trouble when he said racist things.
I believe his ultimatum was basically, he's willing to talk about racial issues, as long as nobody is allowed to mention racism.
Oh no..O'Reilly's gloves are off again! You know what that means..he brought down France and Canada once when he took his gloves off and I'm sure there are numerous corpses out there as a result of his taking his gloves off. Now it's MMfA's turn. Maybe he should just keep his gloves off.
So if tough guy O'Reilly's gloves are off and he's got MM number (since he did lump MM in as a race baiter), then what's he waiting for? Why doesn't he take MM's Brock up on his offer to come on the Factor?
How about it, O'Reilly? Let's see you invite Brock on for a "fight". Or is your "gloves off" rhetoric all just bloviating on your part? My guess is the O'Reilly will never have the guts to do this. He's all hot air.
You are aware of the definition of talking points, yes?
Ok...Col.Sanders, remember it. K? Good boy.
The hateful far-left Media Matters website has branded as racist the following: Alan Colmes, John Gibson, Glenn Beck, Michelle Malkin, Neil Cavuto, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and Fred Barnes, among others.
So? The truth is an absolute defense...
He may be a racist, too, but I couldn't say for sure.
It would not surprise me. I'm sure that ol' Sean made a lot of contacts within the KKK when he was working at radio stations in Alabama and eorgia....
I found two MMFA items about Colmes that dealt with race.
One item commended him for his questioning the accounts of the Oreo cookie incident.
The other one I found is what I assume O'Reilly is talking about. It's where Colmes said that Imus satirized the Rutgers women, instead of insulting them.
I read your MM link about Colmes & Imus and no where did MM call Colmes a racist. Did MM call the other people O'Reilly mentioned "racist"? Probably not.
Apparently O'Reilly has no problem telling his audience lies about what MM says.
I understand what you were doing, Pete. I didn't for one minute think you were siding with O'Reilly. Sorry if I gave the opposite impression of your comment.
I heard O'Reilly talking about this on his radio show and he was definitely talking about MM iitself calling him a racist...not the posters' comments.
Well, as Bill-O's own website shows, the website can't held responsible for the opinions posted in the comments. Otherwise, by proxy, Bill-O advocates violence against presidential candidates.
By the way, I do think Bill-O is a racist, but only because he "couldn't get over" how Sylvia's was just like any other restaurant. If you are surprised at how well black people can run a restaurant, you may not hate black people, but you obviously believe they are inferior in some way, which is the definition of racism.
I think where BilldO gets confused is by his own black and white thinking.(pun not intended but noted)
MMFA often notes items in the media that contain some racial, or arguably racist, comments. To BO, this is "branding as a racist" whoever made the comment. When you've made a career of generalizing, and separating the entire universe into "Good" and "Evil", it must get pretty hard to see any grey areas at all.
However, the point is when people throw the term "racist" around at every turn it begins to lose its effectiveness to real racial injustices. It cheapens and demeans real instances of racism, and begins to be more of a political club against an ideological foe.
That is not what I said and you know it. When you haul out the term racist at every kneejerk opportunity because it's against someone you despise politically, and a cool way to score a political point, then don't expect it to be accepted as anything more namecalling - and it solves nothing and only hardens further racial animosity.
One wonders, if those that engage in politically motivated racial finger pointing, have any interest in overcoming racism at all, or is it far more valuable as a political tool if the fans are flamed.
But you keep at it if you feel like it.
Tommy, I'd like to thank you for reminding us all that it's just not Politically Correct to call people racist.
It's a lesson to us all, we must be sensitive to the feeling of others and avoid using just hurtfull words like "rascist" .
I look forward to your future meritorious censorship of our language here Tommy.
Well Mary, that all depends. Are you insulting my race/ethnicity out of pure ignorance and prejudice just because you don't like my skin color or the country I was born in? That would make you a racist bigot.
But if you are insulting me because you don't like my political views and your labeling me is also motivated by that factor as you wish to marginilize my opinions, effectively cutting them off at the knees to make your point that you can hang the racist or bigot label on? That would make you a race baiter, or a race hustler.
Tommy,
All the people he listed have made some pretty insensitive or stupid statements about race. Now the fact that they are all right wingers maybe because many of the on air right wingers seem to feel this way. They have huge audiences and followers who seem to cheer them when they make these type of statements, so maybe their statemtns relect an elements of their ideiology. I know that they go out of their way to buck political correctness to a point where they are being deliberately rude and insensitive about racial topics.
Thank you Chris, you and Lynn make good points. It is exactly the cavalier way the term "racist" is tossed around by some, it only lessens its impact and becomes more of an insulting swipe than a serious and hideously apt description of a person's moral character.
Tommy, I do not dispute that the word is thrown around too often and for too little reason at times, but O'Reilly is hardly the guy I'd want to defend on this count. His comments indicate that either HE is surprised that African-Americans can act in a civilized manner, or he assumes that the fall back position of whites would be surprise at learning such a thing. Either of those beliefs strike me as racist.
I find Hannity too clueless to classify as a racist; Limbaugh has some history that indicate either he is or he thinkgs acting like one will help his ratings. Alan Colmes is no racist, he's just a pathetic excuse for a liberal/progressive.
As a side note, and not entirely relevant to this discussion, the Iraq veteran who introduced McCain yesterday, saying, "You can have Tiger Woods; we have John McCain." strikes me as pretty clearly racist, yet I've heard little about it.
I'll be back after I get some mother___ing iced tea.
However, the point is when people throw the term "racist" around at every turn it begins to lose its effectiveness to real racial injustices. It cheapens and demeans real instances of racism, and begins to be more of a political club against an ideological foe.
But that's not O'Reilly's point, MMfA does not use the term "racist", yet he attacks them for it nonetheless.
Gov, I have no interest in choosing sides in this senseless and petty fued between and O'Reilly and MMFA, who said what, who accuses who, whatever?
I am speaking of O'Reilly's larger point about the topic of race. As I said, I don't take my cues from him in any way, he also has an agenda to demonize those that take him to task, he has the thinnest skin around and is just whining, for all intents and purposes.
But that doesn't discount the real instances where people use the term "racist" to also demonize their political opponents as a result of some "youtube" moment we live in.
Well said COL.
BTW: Does anyone agree with me that O'Reilly suffers from a severe case of SDS?
-- The hateful far-left Media Matters website has branded as racist the following: Alan Colmes -- oreilly
This must be the monitoring part of mmfa's mission...they issue no correction to the claim that they have branded the doofus leftwinger Colmes as a rascist.
It was O'Reilly who made the claim. How is that MMfA's fault? Oh, I forgot--they're the big bad liberal boogeyman, so it's okay to blame them for someone else's verbal diarrhea...
Exactly. MM posts their statements and I decide for myself if I think they are racist. MM does not call anyone a racist.
O'Reilly is really reaching here because he's just mad that people were able to read his exact words about Sylvia's. People who read here decide for themselves if they thought O'Reilly was being a racist. MM didn't tell them he was.
MMFA needs to take a good look in the mirror. I'm hoping that MMFA listens to Bill O. - it would be for your own good, MMFA.
Honestly, he's trying to help.
Honestly, he's trying to help?! Puh-leeze.
He's just trying to get the heat off himself for his past controversial remarks by getting his audience to think that MM lies about him. Sorry but MM posts his own words in context. They did not call him a racist.
If people are taking his remarks as racist, then he needs to take a look in the mirror at himself.
We know. O'Reilly hates MMFA, and MMFA hates O'Reilly. This fuels much of what comes out of both of their respective arenas, so in my opinion, should be viewed in that context. I also know that MMFA only repeats what O'Reilly says, verbatim, and does not actually editorialize or put forth their own opinion. But there is animosity here towards O'Reilly, justified or not, it is in play, I believe.
That being said, I believe all of O'Reilly's points cannot be discounted as just more of his bloviating blustering against those he despises. He makes a good point about the importance of discussing race openly and honestly in this country. Now, granted, he is hardly the arbiter of such a discussion, but to deny that many tiptoe around some hard truths regarding racial issues in this country is to deny reality.
If Obama's speech a couple weeks did nothing else, it did manage to shine some much needed light on the fears and trepidations many have with this issue.
And type, lefty, type!
"Musiness major"...for the love of Pete...
It's been too long since I've seen Coach's Corner! Grapes...the world's best combination of John Madden and Pat Buchanan...and you have your Sea of Red, and I have mine, now that my Caps have finally made the playoffs...
Now, what was I saying about O'Reilly?...
The relatively large amount of attention O'Reilly has gotten here is fully merited IMO. His posturing as a non-Republican makes him fairer game, for one thing. And he's a bigger fish, who probably sways more votes to the GOP than the others; with I'd say the exception of Limbaugh. He's more persuasive and a superior propagandist to most of them. By comparison, they could plug a robot in for Hannity and it would persuade more people. ................ (And then of course there is O'Reilly's cartoon like disputing of his own words thing, and his seeming out of touchness with what's politically correct---he's not as well plugged in culturally as many of the others it would seem. All unforced errors on his part.)
O'Reilly may give the impression he's not as intentionally evil as many of the Right’s propagandists. The extent to which this impression is communicated to his audience gives him credibility others lack, and resultant greater ability to sway minds.
Fox and Rightwing radio single out those they think will do the most harm to the Right and/or best help the Left. Not necessarily the most flamboyant or obvious. They have an objective to win elections for the GOP. Turn about is fair play for the "Left" to target those who are doing the most harm on the Right.
http://static.flickr.com/48/131420658_c1d01ba19a.jpg
In combat? The only combat this chicken-hawk has ever been in was combat with reality. Of course he does seem to be battling with insanity most of the time.
Ah Bill, now don't take this wrongbut, those nails are filthy. You wanna give someone a desease? Cleanem up! Then scratch their eyes out! Meta- phorically speaking of course.
And no I don't remember Colomes being called a racist either, ineffectual, gostlike, has shown a backbone, but rarely does so, yes.
The result of all this garbage is that millions of white Americans will no longer even think about discussing race with blacks.
Why? Because they think most blacks will transform into Jesse Jackson\Al Sharpton or some other race-baiter and sick the NAACP on them? That sounds awfully racist...OOPS :D
What the hell does this jerk mean the "gloves are off"--"we've got you're number". Well dipsh-t. MMFA is here everyday. And why do you hate the website? You make many claims but where is your proof? Come on little minion, run to Bill and tell him that people around the world have his number. And calling MMFA fascists, now that is grown-up talk. At least Savage uses the term VERMIN.
http://conversationswithv.blogspot.com/
Not that I completely agree with B. Riley but African-Americans can be hyper-sensitive about racial issues. There is a tendency to assume that only the black perspective of racial bias matters. I find this to be a racist point of view. Everyone is affected by racism. Until we can all be honest and respectful of the varied thoughts and feelings of others, we will always have a gross racial divide.
Really? Do you think? Do you think that there might be a very good REASON why black people are, as you say, "hypersensitive" about racism and racial bias?
Jeesh... Been living in a cave for how long you've been in the world?
Racism isn't a problem for everyone, only for those who are victims of it. I am a 34 year old white male. I haven't had ANY issues with racism my entire life, nor will I probably EVER have any racism issues. Why? Because the power in this country resides firmly in the talons of people just like me.
Don't this idiot's listeners ever get sick of hearing the blowhard coward's "gloves off, dick out!" rhetoric, which he never follows through on?
Nothing more pathetic than a serial empty-threatener.
Branding: I guess O'Reilly is saying that he is branded a racist because he insists he is not, and yet, his words are quoted here and refered to as racialy insensitive. Then he lies about what he said, those words are quoted and he is refered to as a non truth teller.
racist: My grandfather was a racise by anyones definition, he advocated vigilante murder of blacks if they so much as showed up in his small western colorado town. I consider myself a racist as I get nervous and stumble over my words when introduced to a black stranger. Sometimes it's good to move the goal posts.
Donno, I started wondering at what other people experienced very early. I do remember The Harlem Globtrotters came to Libby Montana in the mid 50's. A ball went off court and hit a small child. One off the Globtrotters held the child , with the ball up to the hoop. The child didn't like him much and dropped the ball to the side and shortly found himself back at the hoop with the ball again. It seemed like he wasn't going anywhere till he made a basket he thought, so he made one and was free to be a spectator again with his family.
I spent a lot of time sensce then working and living with all kinds of people. Nobody whose family came from Tibet, Iceland, or parts of South America, as far as I know. I've found I like people in general and usually in particular, and there are scuts of any type. Granted most of the recent scuts tend to whiteness, fattness, no empathy, or concern beyond water and/or power retension.
George W. Bush
George H. W. Bush
Ronald Reagan
Newt Gingrich
Don Imus
Trent Lott
Gary Hart
Jeb Bush
Alan Colmes
John Gibson
Glenn Beck
Michelle Malkin
Neil Cavuto
Sean Hannity
Rush Limbaugh
Fred Barnes
Joe Biden
Geraldine Ferraro
Bill Maher
Wonder when he's gonna issue the complete list...
Now here's something Fox Prolefeed (or, for that matter, the rest of the MSM) doesn't want you to hear:
The overt and brazen racism of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), whose Texas compound was raided last weekend and some 400 female inmates rescued therefrom in response to charges of Indecent Sexual Assault and Child Sexual Abuse.
does "coming after you" mean he's gonna sick one of his interns on you at the grocery store?
also, it's funny he names jesse jackson and has in the past named al sharpton as "race baiters" but who did he run to when he got in trouble over sylvia's? al and jesse. guess he's mad they wouldn't defend his dumbass
whew Billy,
I'm shakin' in my Kangol hat & Timberline boots.....pretty scary stuff, big guy!!!!!