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When I returned from living abroad, I was delighted to discover Bill O’Reilly on Fox News. Mr. O’Reilly’s no-holds-barred “right wing” commentary was a stark contrast to the proto-fascist statism of British broadcasting that I’d endured for more than a decade. But the more I watched the towering Empire Stater “opine,” the less I liked him or his message . . .

You don’t have to give credence to the charges of sexual harassment leveled against Mr. O’Reilly to conclude that he’s an egomaniacal bully. Just watch his show.

The Foxenator browbeats “interviewees,” panelists and correspondents with constant interruptions, heavily sprinkled with condescending and/or derisive remarks. He demeans his co-workers (O’Reilly’s petty snipes at Glenn Beck were particularly odious). He never honors his interview closer — “I’ll give you the last word.”

Why would he? It would detract from the main theme of Mr. O’Reilly’s “No Spin Zone”: BOR’s the ultimate arbiter of the truth.

The fact that millions of viewers who consider themselves conservatives are happy to surrender to The World According to Bill O’Reilly is pretty scary. Especially when you consider the fact that Mr. O’Reilly’s “truth” does not conform to conservative values.

Certainly not when it comes to the Second Amendment. A problem we’ve identified here many times. Here’s evidence, from our post Bill O’Reilly Bails on the Bill of Rights, Calls for Gun Control

. . . the Second Amendment clearly states the government has a right to regulate militias, made up of individuals. They have that right in the name of public safety. Therefore, Congress should debate what kind of weapons should be available for public sale. And the states, the individual states, should decide what kind of carry laws are good for their own people.

Mr. O’Reilly has labelled the Oath Keepers’ oath an “extreme position” and stated his belief that gun confiscation is OK in an emergency (e.g. a hurricane). None of which is surprising, really. Elitists don’t support firearms freedom.

The People of the Gun should choose their champions carefully. While we wait to see what more President Trump can do for gun rights restoration, there’s no need to wait to see Mr. O’Reilly’s opinion on the Hearing Protection Act or National Reciprocity. As my cannoli-loving acquaintances in Rhode Island would say, Mr. O’Reilly is not a friend of ours.

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98 COMMENTS

  1. You really can’t trust anybody in the MSM it doesn’t matter what channel they are on. Unfortunately we live in an age where if you want the truth you are going to have to find it for yourself and not be a sheeple.

    • It’s always been that way when it came to truth in media. The press of 100 to 200 years ago was worse and more politicized than today, but the difference in political opinion then was minute compared to today where it’s literally communist agitators and racist, sexist SJW’s crying foul about the evils of White men.

      You’re right though about finding truth for yourself. If you watch anything on a television channel, you can assume it’s all fake news.

      • All of the above. There’s a small handful of media outlets that I deem trustworthy, but in the end, the media has no real incentive to give us any complete, impartial truth. What good is truth if they can achieve a political agenda by influencing the way you think?

        One could say that TTAG too is out to achieve a political agenda, but if it’s in the defense of a natural right, then it’s a good agenda no matter how you slice it.

        • Even the media outlets I like, I don’t trust.

          You can take some people’s word on some things, but until you know enough to determine what those things are, it’s best to assume everyone in the media is either wrong or mistaken to some degree.

    • Bill is a Neo Con/Cuckservative.

      He does not care about what he claims, he just uses it to assert moral authority.

      You can tell he is a Cuckservative namely and if only for the reason he has more then 3 million viewers but refuses to use the power he has to effect the change he claims to want. He could have them donate to like minded candidates, give them air time, cite them against Congress, etc. He he does not. Why? He wants to claim the more high ground as he does not want to be an “advocate” or “activist”.

      As if “the moral high ground” of NOT taking actions does anything to either advance the so called “values” and “goals” or stop the enemies of freedom.

      In short he is just a fool, a con man, a do nothing, or a cuck.

      He has power, but not the will to use it. Worse then useless.

      Its Fox, so many hot women, who would not harass them. Andrea Tantros and a Kimberly Milfolye would make a great sandwhich. Giggty!

    • It’s a testament to how hard up anyone to the right of the left is for news coverage. George Stephanopoulos, Fareed Zakaria, and Van Jones are anchors on other channels. In the mid 90s and early 00s, Jones was a Maoist. Then he got a spot at the White House. Now he has a CNN show. Apparently he, in his own words, dropped “the cheap satisfaction of the radical pose for the deep satisfaction of radical ends.”

  2. O’Reilly doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground when it comes to firea rms. But that doesn’t keep him from spewing his ignorance everywhere.

    Beck does the same back to O’Reilly when he goes on his radio show. It’s pretty funny. And if you ever get the chance to hear Beck and Don Imus go at it you’ll be rolling on the floor. Total insult fest.

  3. My problem with his comments on guns is that he is totally ignorant on the subject and will not make any effort to educate himself He has his opinion and because it is HIS, it is the right opinion. Total elitist. And he is what he blasts other people for being.

  4. This is all true! But ask yourself this:
    1. Does Bill O’s stand on guns really hurt us?
    2. Does his support for Justice Gorsuch and generally pro-gun Republicans help us?
    On balance, Bill O’ helps energize voters who will end up overwhelmingly supporting Pro-2A candidates and causes, IMHO.

      • Hey Robert, just curious, did you know the guy you replied to uses as his username the name of a very vocal anti-semite and Nazi sympathizer (who was part of the Hungarian Nazi party and wrote books advocating for the extermination of the Jewish people while laying the blame for all economic and cultural problem in Europe at their feet)? And uses the official symbol of the Hungarian Nazi party (responsible for the murder/genocide of over 20k innocent civilians and the shipping off of over 80k more to concentration camps in Austria, during their short 5-month rule in Hungary) as his avatar/image? You’ve made a point of discussing your family’s history during WWII and how it has impacted your attitude towards firearms ownership and opposition to tyranny. Thought you might be interested to know the views of the people you’re interacting with.

        • Does the fact that someone is an averred Communist or Nazi (or other odious and murderous ideology,) mean that one should not engage them in a polite conversation?

          The question is sincere.

        • Johannes, that’s entirely up to the person. For me, no. If someone openly espoused a philosophy that myself, my entire family going back generations, my religion, my culture was subhuman and deserved to be killed in horrific ways like vermin of some sort, then no, personally I would not choose to engage with them in any meaningful conversation. I don’t think that’s a wall that I could ever overcome, and I’m pretty sure nothing productive would come from it. I know Robert has made his feeling towards Nazi-ism pretty clear, so I thought he deserved to know (in case he didn;t already) that the person he was interacting with held those views, so that he could decide for himself. I regularly engage with people with dramatically differing points of view from mine on topics like religion, politics, law enforcement, art, race, whatever, discussing those particular points of contention. I’m not a “if you don’t believe exactly like I do i have no reason to talk to you” kinda guy. But there are SOME philosophies that are so antithetical to my own beliefs, or so morally repugnant that I can’t look past it to have a meaningful conversation in the first place, and even if I could I doubt there’d be any point.

    • Yes it does. Others who are inclined to watch his show and are otherwise ignorant of firearms adopt this line of thinking.

      Ignorance is ignorance. This is ignorance spreading ignorance.

      The position stated is about the same as saying Donald Trump is our friend because he’s not Hillary. Okay. I guess the guy who broke my legs is my friend because he didn’t kill me. Sounds like beaten woman syndrome to me.

      • I may be wrong, but my opinion of O’Reilly is that when he interviews people, whether from the right , left, or center is, he plays Devil’s advocate. He makes the debate interesting.
        My favorite segment is Miller Time. Dennis Miller loathes SJWs and for O’Reilly to give so much airtime to Miller is a win in my book.

        • That’s because Miller has a brain & not a hair piece. O’reilly is playing a character, and in reality is a drunken blue-blood lout. Just an entertainer, same as Limbaugh is & always says about his own commentary. There’s a reason he once got in a drunken brawl with Al Franken & has had multiple phone sex & harassment beefs over the years. It’s the same reason he frequently shouts down guests, generally invites incoherent “debate” “opponents” as opposed to practiced speakers, and chugs gun control pablum like an average NYC democrat mook.

          For reference since I haven’t seen it mentioned, google “O’reilly on-air freak-out”

    • Of course it hurts us. It hurts us more than MSNBC and the like- because when bad gun bills are passed federally, it is always with the aid and comfort of some ‘conservatives’ who can use people like Bill to take cover. He helps create a general zeitgeist where it’s okay to be a republican and conservative without caring about (or even understanding) the 2nd Amendment.

    • You’re failing to acknowledge the difference between what is seen and what is not seen. Sure, O’Reilly does energize a generally conservative audience, providing the animation and agitation they won’t get elsewhere. It’s red meat, as far as that goes. That’s what’s seen. The problem is, it doesn’t go very far and certainly not far enough. That’s what’s unseen.

      O’Reilly is a portrait of missed opportunities through misaligned priorities. His goals are fortune and fame. He’ll push people’s buttons as long as it keeps them tuning in, but he doesn’t really understand the underlying issues, nor does he care to. That’s why he misses the mark so often and wastes the opportunities he has to educate the public and make the case for conservatism. Conservatism has always just been his expedient prop.

      He’ll use it as long as it advances his aims, but he won’t do anything to advance conservatism’s goals. It, and his cheezy Harvard degree in public affairs, were always just his tickets to legitimacy and respectability, and away from syndicated, schlock “infotainment”, trash T.V. like “Inside Edition.”

  5. Senile old world order neo-con like McCain, Rumsfeld, Schumer, and Hillary Clinton and Kaine pandering to the 70 year olds who still buy into their tripe.

  6. He’s wrong on a lot of things but useful enough when he’s badgering people I can’t stand. I don’t watch him much so I don’t care what happens to his show. He’s been on for 20 years so maybe it’s time to retire.

  7. My 70 year old father-in-law actually buys (and wears) O’Reilly’s No Spin Zone t-shirts, hats and door mats. And then gets mad when we won’t be seen with him in public…

  8. O’Reilly has never been a conservative, not even close. He’s an entertainer, don’t look to him or 95% of others on tv for any information on a subject. They are all very ignorant of nearly every subject they talk about.

  9. Yeah, this dude, along with a few others is why I quit watching fox. Fox is by NO means conservative, just anti democrat. That’s ok and all, but if you watch them long enough you’ll see they are underline liberal even. It comes out here and there with an “Overton window” approach. There’s only two anchors on that channel who are for real pro gun. Hannity, and that Eric guy I don’t remember his last name.

      • TTAG wrote an article about Rachel Maddow. It turns out she LOVES guns and goes shootin’ all the time, even when she’s traveling on business. Who knew…

        • Guns are a novelty to Rachel Madcow. She doesn’t support the 2nd amendment and she doesn’t own guns. She rents them at the range and she believes that no one should have guns at home. She thinks guns should be in the hands of Statist authorities or should be there for entertainment purposes only at gun range amusement parks.

      • Right… Fox isn’t conservative enough for me so I switched to MSNBC…. Are you pants on head retarded boy?

        • Fox is not “Conservative,” Fox is Republican. And if you don’t know the difference, you are pants-on-head-AFTER-you shit-them retarded.

  10. “High powered weapons” I’m going to assume are rifles. If you look at the guns of choice for criminals they are small cheap compact handguns. Rifles are used in 250ish of our 11,000ish gun homicides. Why all the hubbub about rifles?

    Because the establishment knows rifles real usefulness is to curb tyranny if it comes. They don’t care about murders or they would be talking about cheap revolvers and pocket pistols that hold less than 7 rounds. That’s the type criminals use.

    Instead they focus on rifles that are used in an insignificant number of crimes. Control is what Bill, Soros and the rest of their ilk care about. Not saving lives. More kids drown in residential swimming pools than are killed by rifles. 50 people die from bee stings, 35 from dogs and I could go on, but 250 from rifles gets a disproportionate amount of time.

    • Semi-automatic rifles are a feint for semi-automatic pistols; always have been. Heller shut down handgun control temporarily, but it’s pretty obvious that if an AR15 with 30rnd mags is bannable, so is a Glock with 30s. If an AR15 that shoots 30 magazineclips a second is too much firepower, it follows a Glock is just as fast, and therefore vulnerable.

    • “High powered weapons” can be a descriptor for all guns. Even the anemic .22lr has thousands of pounds of pressure spitting lead above the speed of sound.

      The deception comes when anti 2A people only use that phrase to describe assault rifles. Obviously an AR 15 is high powered, this is true. Find me the liberal who can and is willing to explain why it’s MORE high powered than the Ruger Mini 14.

    • They [the establishment] don’t care about murders or they would be talking about cheap revolvers and pocket pistols that hold less than 7 rounds.

      While the establishment has talked a LOT about pocket pistols, that is neither here nor there. If the establishment were really serious about reducing murders, they would stop stop let violent criminals out of prison after serving 18 months for armed robbery.

  11. O Blimey has never been conservative, he just appears like one for ratings by talking tough and acting like an ass. As time has gone on, he went from being “controversial” to milk toast, just like John McCain went from being Republican to a RINO.

    Leprechaun Bill is a city slicker who would probably pee himself if he heard the backfire of a car in an alley. It’s amazing that a guy like him roams the halls of Fox News and rules with an iron shillelagh.

    • You forgot to call him a ‘papist’ you big racist. (I’m obviously kidding, O’liberal makes a big deal out of his abandoned heritage about as much as a race hustler that does the same for a living)

  12. O’Reilly is _NOT_ a Bostonian. He is a Long Island native. Us Bostonians may not have our feces coagulated, but that dubba ain’t ours.

    • Wow; I used to watch him & didn’t realize he was even trying to hide the obvious NYC roots. Not that there’s a terrible difference between anyone from NYC & Boston at this point to anyone further south/west than Philadelphia

  13. I mainly watch O’Reilly to yell at him. I quit watching when he jumped on the Trump bandwagon-his buddy- and after the election I’m cool. He’s ignorant on lots of things too. I don’t think he’s a virulent enemy to the 2nd. Just another blowhard. Oh RF I believe he grew up in LONG ISLAND,NY…

      • He spent some time in Denver, too, as Bill Reilly. Word has it a certain large radio corporation paid off an intern or two while he was here.

    • Yup, so what if possibly the second or third most prominent/best known republican commentator is totes cool with gun control; no biggie.

      His garbage is routinely cited by anti’s claiming their radical ban-schemes are ‘reasonable, even o’reilly thinks so’ every time he opens his yap. He’s barely conservative in like three other policy areas besides, and even then mostly on the social-issue spots that a) haven’t been very productive ground for at least twenty years or more, and b) don’t really have much effect on governance or balance of power going forward. And even then, those of us with a libertarian bent will see them as the same kind of restrictive double-standard favored by supporters of gun control.

  14. Like anything on TV or the internet you have to filter what he says through your own lens. Some of his opinions on immigration and calling out the SJW/BLM/Libtard sycophants is spot on. His opinion on guns couldn’t be more wrong. Like some have said….this isn’t news, it’s entertainment. Don’t take it too seriously given what it is.

  15. While I have watched the O’Reilly Factor for close to 2 decades, I am not a “Kool-Aid drinking” fan of his. I do find his viewpoint on many items to be worthy of my time to hear and consider it. While I do disagree with his perspective on significantly less issues than I agree with him, I am in full disagreement with his perspective on the Second Amendment. For a history buff and author, his 2A perspective is either based on extremely inadequate research or extreme personal bias. While we have several of his “Killing” series books in our house, his 2A commentary could be the basis for a future book titled “Killing the Second Amendment”.

    • I know, right? For a guy who obviously studies history as much as he does (American history, no less), it’s incomprehensible to me that he still holds his anti-gun views. Makes me suspect his research consists of reading only the news articles written by forgotten reporters that were probably just as anti-gun urban nanny-stater then as they are now.

  16. He always refers to AR-15s as “high powered,” even though they aren’t powerful enough to be legally used to hunt deer in many parts of the country.

    He’s an ignorant blowhard when it comes to firearms, and refuses to learn the facts; so I don’t really pay attention to him anymore. I take his lack of knowledge about 1) firearms and 2) the real meaning of the 2nd Amendment, as proof that his ghostwriter is the one that does all of the actual research and writing on his popular “Killing” series of nonfiction books.

    • The NRA defines the .223/5.56 as a high-powered rifle for competition purposes. We have lost that argument, which is a shame, because it’s not, really.

      • Why do we give a flying fuck? Let’s drop the whole “assault rifle” argument while we’re at it.
        The 2nd Amendment protects high powered rifles and assault weapons.
        Defend your right to own them rather than argue semantics.
        It’s like when blacks couldn’t drink from the whites only fountain. Rather than point out the racism as being wrong, what if they argued “but I ain’t black”.

        • No kidding; a Glock fires just as many magazineclips per second as an AR15, after all (and obviously to much greater effect at the end of the day, going by the homicide numbers)

  17. Unfortunately, charisma sells. The most charismatic people of history are the likes of Hitler, Jim Jones, Mao, and about every other two-bit murderous dictator. Being a student of history and avid news junky, I have learned to validate the truthfulness of everything I read or watch…especially content from those people who sound trustworthy.

    • “Amway products are so good, they practically sell themselves” –Morgan Freeman (in a segment of the Colbert Report; Freeman had just been named “most trustworthy voice” by a magazine, and Colbert was having him say untrustworthy things)

  18. The NRA has already limited the types of weapons that the public can buy, own and use. The fact that different states have even more restricted laws(on top of the repressive laws the feds have), is way over the top.

    The feds regulate vehicles that can drive on the highway, some states give a pass to vehicles that do not apply to D.O.T. regulations, but thay can not limit U.S. licensed vehicles(for the highway), so the D.O.T. takes precedence. It also states that used vehicles that were sold in the U.S.(with 7500 miles on the odometer), with stock equipment are to be licensed in another state by a legal resident(of that state) with a drivers’ license from said state.

    Firearms should be no different.

    • Lets not stop there. If I am on my own property I can do whatever the hell I want to with my vehicles pretty much emissions safety etc. don’t apply. Can’t say that about guns. Then again the EPA is trying to step in on that kinda stuff now too.

    • Firearms merely “existing” isn’t the same as using them, and you know it. Conflating the two is the source of nearly all our misbegotten gun control laws (and nakedly racist oppression the remainder)

  19. He is a horrible person, who has helped lower the level of the public policy conversation in this country.

  20. BRAVO for doing something that is so rare in the 21st-century American: Thinking for yourself.
    What the hell has happened to us? When I was a kid, and I’d hear grown men talk about the things that matter in our world, they were, to a man, people who thought for themselves. They agreed with the people who dominate the media sometimes, and they disagreed with them at other times.
    They didn’t just shrug off inexcusable deeds, either. Most Republican politicians voted to impeach a Republican president (Nixon) because they cared more about our country than they cared about winning at any cost to their souls.
    That wise act would never happen in today’s America. It’s a very real problem with our character, and it’s actions like yours that will be necessary for all of us to get over ourselves.
    Don’t just let anyone tell you what to believe, folks. Question everyone.
    And yes, that does include me.

    • Amen to that, probably the #1 reason I was glad Hillary didn’t get in; she’s a criminal, would have conducted herself as such and had to answer to no one; At least if/when Trump crosses the boundaries there’s a chance the Republicans will fragment and something will be done about it. Plausibly not a super high one, but one none the less.

      Cults of personality are bad on any side. I think that’s one of the worse things about Obama is that people refused to see the stupid/illegal shit he did because of it.

      That said even if I was going to be on the bandwagon of a media figure, it’d likely be Ben Shapiro; While I don’t agree with him on some things, perhaps the idea of government not being the answer to the world’s ills isn’t a bad thing.

    • “When I was a kid, and I’d hear grown men talk about the things that matter in our world, they were, to a man, people who thought for themselves”

      Bullshit. Two words: Walter Cronkite. Three more words: “Remember the Maine!” We’re only seeing the media manipulation now because technology (for a time) bypassed their stranglehold on public discourse, though they are clamping down fast having realized that. The reason the men in your youth sounded so sure of their views of the world is because you were a kid; you’d probably see them as ignorant blowhards like everyone else today (I will grant you that the breadth of peoples’ exposure to national/world affairs used to be smaller, and it’s actually possible to be wise about local issues that impact you most directly vs. abstract musings about the far side of the globe)

    • Yes! I’m glad someone mentioned that. Only thing better would be footage of that drunken fist-fight with Al Franken at some press dinner (alleged)

  21. The 2nd Amendment does not grant the US government the power to regulate the militia. Article I, section 8 does that. The 2nd Amendment places an important restriction on that power: it may not infringe on the people’s right to bear arms.

  22. He uses the term “heavy weapons” all the time. Of course, nobody knows what that means, least of all him, but he’s not going to let ignorance stop him from stating his opinions as facts.

  23. The fact is, it’s pretty bleak out there in the world of political commentary. O’Reilly actually looks pretty good in comparison to his peers at FNC and elsewhere. Or do you prefer Ticker Carlson with his furrowed brow and open mouth — like he’s having difficulty passing a stool — eviscerating every guest? It is amazing that anyone is so foolish as to do his show. He makes O’Reilly’s takedowns look like child’s play. Or do you like that enthusiastic braying jackass Hannity, who can only shout people down because he cannot win a debate with wit. Then there is FBN with that eternal bore Lou Dobbs.

    So all things considered, O’Reilly isn’t that bad after all.

    • Actual news as opposed to commentary would be a nice change of pace, but I understand that’s not really Fox’s bailiwick. That new cable channel supposedly funded by libertarians or whatever (OAN?) seems like a fairly decent counterpoint to NPR’s relatively professional but extremely filtered/censored reporting. Those two seem to cover most of what you’d hear about through television venues (obviously online is even more complete, though)

      • When was it never not all about HIM? He hasn’t changed. It has always been about him. Just like every other news anchor/host.

  24. While comparing “The Factor” to available competitors may lead us to conclude “O’Reilly isn’t that bad”, like a growing number of Americans, I believe the excellence of America’s Constitution and the Second Amendment allows and directs Americans towards excellence. Our media news is still directed by ratings (read personalities) and may always be limited to “not too bad” or “not as bad as” in comparison. It remains for we citizens to question and cross reference every news source and apply our own sense of excellence to rough sawn lumber news sources.

  25. Bill is a traditionalist. But he’s from New Your City. I don’t watch him that much anymore. If he was like Glen Herman of New York City Guns podcast his show would be even better. Pro gun I mean. Herman curses to much on his show for TV.

    http://newyorkcityguns.com/radio/

  26. I know this thread is probably already dead but if anyone wants some Bill O’Reilly hilarity then google “Bill O’Reilly Flips Out-DANCE REMIX” by shananagains on YouTube. It’s pretty good.

  27. I’ve always loathed O’Reilly. A close family friend has been on his show a couple of times. He said that his off-air behaviour is substantially worse than even how he performs on air. Things like throwing coffee at interns and screaming sexual and racial slurs at staff backstage. All tolerated because he’s a “star”.

  28. Doesn’t take more than an episode or two to realize he is an unprincipled con-man. The “looking out for the folks” thing is silly beyond words, but people eat it up

  29. Way to go people. Take shots at one of the most articulate and widely heard conservative voices in the media today. That’s a great way to advance your cause. Hey, the guy’s not perfect but he’s more of a help than a hinderance. For people who claim to know guns, you’re sure good at shooting yourselves in the foot.

  30. I watch his show for the entertainment value and don’t get and don’t expect the unvarnished truth. I enjoy some of his segments where he is not the star (Watters World, etc).

  31. O’Reilly is what he is. He’s got some ideas that are good, and some that are goofy.

    (I expect he’d say the same of me.)

    He’s popular, though, and there’s a reason for that. He’s clearly connecting with someone.

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