Irish America's best journalists

"I hope it was his writing foot."

On being a journalist:

"Certainly the best newspapermen I know are those most thrilled by the daily pump of city room excitements; they long fondly for a ''good murder''; they pray that assassinations, wars, catastrophes break on their editions. Their personal lives are usually a mess."

On having a Jesuit education:

"They’ve probably created more atheists than communism ever did."

 

4. Alexander Cockburn

So far on this list, all the Irish-American journalists have been fairly left-leaning: but none can outdo Alexander Cockburn when it comes to their leftiness. Cockburn, the editor of the biweekly political newsletter, Counterpunch, is one of the most famous radical journalists in the US. He grew up in Youghal, Co. Cork, and has lived and worked in the U.S since 1973. He once said that Gerald Ford was the US’s greatest president for having done the least “possible harm.” Like a true Irishman, who’s never held a grudge he couldn’t let go of, Cockburn had a fantastic falling out with his former comrade, Christopher Hitchens, after Hitchens suddenly became a Bush supporter after 9/11.

Best quotes

On Christopher Hithens:

“What a truly disgusting sack of sh*t Hitchens is.”

 

5. Bill O’Reilly 

In an interview with The Irish Voice, Bill O’Reilly described himself as “a quintessential working class Irish-American Catholic.” Indeed O’Reilly take pride in his Irishness, proclaiming in one of his books, “Whatever I have done or will do in this life, I’m working-class Irish American Bill O’Reilly.” Like many Irish people, he loves a good feud – and he takes more time attacking (or counter-attacking) those in the “liberal media” as he does attacking politicians who don’t share his conservative views.

Best quotes

If the Americans go in and overthrow Saddam Hussein and it's clean, he has nothing, I will apologize to the nation, and I will not trust the Bush Administration again, all right?"

“I think it is important to look ahead rather than to look back. What good does it do to rehash WMDs? Does that do you any good?”

"I was wrong. I am not pleased about it at all and I think all Americans should be concerned about this…What do you want me to do, go over and kiss the camera?"

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