It's no secret, Stephen Colbert based his wildly popular fake news pundit on America’s most popular Fox News pundit Bill 'Papa Bear' O'Reilly.

According to the Huffington Post, on his opening show of 2013 Colbert took the opportunity to lampoon O'Reilly's latest racial gaffe: that he's surprised by how much of Hawaii's 35% Asian population is 'liberal,' considering 'Asian people are not liberal, you know, by nature. They're usually more industrious and hard-working.'

Wisely anticipating the avalanche of incoming criticism, Colbert instantly defended O'Reilly from 'the liberal media,' which in this case turned out to be Ed Schultz, and he stood firm against accusations that O'Reilly had made insensitive, racially generalizing comments:

'Folks, Bill was not being racist. He was simply painting an entire race with one brush,' Colbert joked.

According to the Huffington Post, O'Reilly was actually making informed comments when it came to Hawaii's demographics, which he suggested presented the true picture about the issues facing the island state.

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The island state’s relatively high levels of social ills, such as drug addiction and crime, reportedly surprised O'Reilly, who noted 35 percent of Hawaii's population is Asian.

O'Reilly added that white people are outnumbered 'by more than two to one' there, which he claimed explained the state's 'big time' margin of votes for President Obama in the 2012 election.

According to US Census data from 2011, Asians constitute 38.5 percent of Hawaii's population, with Native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders accounting for another 10.1 percent. White people actually comprise just over a quarter of the island's demographics, at 26 percent. In the 2012 US Presidential election, President Obama won Hawaii by a more than 40 percent margin.
But demographics are one issue, extrapolating the racial character of the biggest percentage of the world’s population from them is something Colbert probably wishes O'Reilly will continue to do, even if Asians themselves cringe or take offense at his effort.

Bill O'Reilly Confused By 'Liberal' Asians Who Don't Meet His Stereotype -