Bill O'Reilly is a liability to the Irish community in racially sensitive America
Posted on Tuesday, July 13, 2010 at 11:04 PM
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Michelle Obama gave a speech to the NAACP yesterday. She cited tragic statistics about the African American community and the speech was televised.
Meanwhile, Mel Gibson is all over the "news" with audio clips adding nothing but crap to the racial discourse here.
In the same news cycle, Bill O'Reilly made a speech on his show about the first lady, wherein he dissected the African American community in a three minute segment. It appeared on Fox on July 13th.
Bill O'Reilly is pretty much Irish America to the American television public. It's a sick joke, but he's some kind of O'-bearing Max Headron to people. He's the big O' that gets more zombies than other talking heads.
To rebutt Obama, O'Reilly tore into statistics about African American men and crime. He gave no context. He said nothing about the destruction of affluent Black neighborhoods in the 1950s when jobs were exported offshore. Within a generation of joblessness, Black affluence was a forgotten memory, and strong Black communities were disintegrating to drugs, violence and the kind of thing you see in Limerick today.
His tone was sickeningly condescending. His face was contorted to show his contempt. He was just disrespectful, and it's not good for us.
O'Reilly's numbers and his criticism of failed social policies in the 1960s are what everyone is talking about. There's nothing new in his spiel. He said nothing about the big waste of social resources on prisons, war, military, nation-building and bank bailouts that could have been better spent in America to create the model society every generation before us had strived to build. That would have been new. Instead we just accept the mis-spending that left so much urban infrastructure and so many communities in ruins.
O'Reilly must chalk everything up to self-reliance, because his pay-masters would never let him tell us that we're wasting far more money on the rich and their wars than on the Blacks and their schools.
If urban Black populations do not find good work, then Michelle Obama's statistics and the ones Bill O'Reilly cited will change little. Our policies promote job flight.
We mis-spend our national resources. We legislate in favor of corporations, while undermining our national industry.
Bill O'Reilly doesn't talk about that. He talks about culture wars that make Irish American males look like racially insensitive pinheads.
Meanwhile, Mel Gibson is all over the "news" with audio clips adding nothing but crap to the racial discourse here.
In the same news cycle, Bill O'Reilly made a speech on his show about the first lady, wherein he dissected the African American community in a three minute segment. It appeared on Fox on July 13th.
Bill O'Reilly is pretty much Irish America to the American television public. It's a sick joke, but he's some kind of O'-bearing Max Headron to people. He's the big O' that gets more zombies than other talking heads.
To rebutt Obama, O'Reilly tore into statistics about African American men and crime. He gave no context. He said nothing about the destruction of affluent Black neighborhoods in the 1950s when jobs were exported offshore. Within a generation of joblessness, Black affluence was a forgotten memory, and strong Black communities were disintegrating to drugs, violence and the kind of thing you see in Limerick today.
His tone was sickeningly condescending. His face was contorted to show his contempt. He was just disrespectful, and it's not good for us.
O'Reilly's numbers and his criticism of failed social policies in the 1960s are what everyone is talking about. There's nothing new in his spiel. He said nothing about the big waste of social resources on prisons, war, military, nation-building and bank bailouts that could have been better spent in America to create the model society every generation before us had strived to build. That would have been new. Instead we just accept the mis-spending that left so much urban infrastructure and so many communities in ruins.
O'Reilly must chalk everything up to self-reliance, because his pay-masters would never let him tell us that we're wasting far more money on the rich and their wars than on the Blacks and their schools.
If urban Black populations do not find good work, then Michelle Obama's statistics and the ones Bill O'Reilly cited will change little. Our policies promote job flight.
We mis-spend our national resources. We legislate in favor of corporations, while undermining our national industry.
Bill O'Reilly doesn't talk about that. He talks about culture wars that make Irish American males look like racially insensitive pinheads.
101 comments
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hancock | Jul 22, 2010, 07:12 PM EDT
Sanity, and not liberal, childish college age hysteria.
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MAnicShiocain | Jul 22, 2010, 11:01 AM EDT
To complete the analogy, I should have mentioned that the NYC Draft Riots, which were called the Irish Riots at that time, were quelled by "NY's Finest," the city's police forces that were 90% Irish. So I'm surprised that there is not an Irish-American outcry against Bill O'R. When we identify with a public figure, we lose our capacity to think critically about what the public figure represents. So I ask again, what is it that you identify with in Bill O' Reilly?
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MAnicShiocain | Jul 22, 2010, 10:48 AM EDT
I missed the O'Reilly show that Brendan writes about. Heck, I'm happy to miss O'Reilly anytime! Reading about it here, I think it sounds as though BO'R was doing a verbal replay of mid-July 1863 (the NYC Draft Riots, in which Irish lynched African Americans from lampposts, destroyed their homes and neighborhood shops, burnt their churches and orphanage, etc.). That's the kind of history that BO'R should have learned something from. Brendan is certainly right that BO'R makes "Irish American males look like racially insensitive pinheads." But this is America, where we do not accept guilt by association.
I do believe, however, in guilt by default. And to let BO'R spout his thinly-veiled racism without responding would be to default on moral responsibility. BO'R is both devious and incredibly sloppy in his thinking. He cannot think his way out of the proverbial paper bag. Why aren't more Irish Americans responding by pointing out the sloppiness? What is it about BO'R that Irish Americans identify with when they defend him and refuse to acknowledge the racism and classism in his words?
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Monsoonman | Jul 18, 2010, 09:02 PM EDT
OK Sean, I won't pick on the Kennedys, however this is the Irish Central site, so I though it appropriate...OK I'll single out George Soros then, ya happy now?...But there's not one billionaire worth his/her salt who won't employ the smartest personnel to shield them from taxes. Just ask Bill Gates, Ted Turner, Warren Buffet or Oprah.
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seanomelbourne | Jul 18, 2010, 08:08 PM EDT
I never mentioned Gretta or Geraldo in my piece. I find Geraldo at times reasonable in his argument. I mistrust crossover political pundits regardless of their beliefs.What is their agenda?.It's certainly not principals or a core belief. Why do you choose only the Kennedy's as an example. Are you giving conservative billionaires a pass? as if they are entitled to scam the system,now let's be fair Moonsoonman .
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Monsoonman | Jul 18, 2010, 01:41 PM EDT
The income tax needs to be eliminated. That is the most evil, manipulative, unfair way of controlling the populace. Make a small sales tax, tax imports and shrink govt. to fit, because the "rich" will always find a way to avoid their income taxes. Anybody ever see any of the Kennedys tax returns? You probably won't see the millions funneled into them from their offshored trusts.BTW: Gretta van sustern used to be a liberal commentator on cnn, along with Geraldo. They both are allowed and encouraged on fox. Gretta had a stroke a few years back, that is why her face is disfigured....Hola Sean!
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WoundedKnee | Jul 18, 2010, 07:38 AM EDT
Is there any less attractive shrew on TV than that woman Gretchen on Fox?
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BrendanPKeane | Jul 18, 2010, 07:05 AM EDT
I have nothing against rich people that earn their money and pay their taxes. I think making a fortune is a human right and one of the great things about America. I abhor communism. The problem is that a super-rich elite avoid taxes, and manipulate our government extra-democratically. This has destroyed our infrastructure and burdened us with costly wars unnecessarily. The super-rich profit from this misery.
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hancock | Jul 18, 2010, 01:01 AM EDT
You need a diaper and a rattle you bleeding heart crybaby.
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seanomelbourne | Jul 17, 2010, 11:56 PM EDT
The only "no spin zone" on cable is "judge Judy". Hancock needs some Kool Aid.
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seanomelbourne | Jul 17, 2010, 11:53 PM EDT
I've come to the conclusion the only "no spin zone" on cable is judge Judy
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seanomelbourne | Jul 17, 2010, 06:53 PM EDT
As a Retired millionaire I agree with Brendan and Denis I must not forget McNamara. It amuses me that O'Reilly and his ilk demonise the president because he was educated in an ivy league university and the good old "folksies" at Fox O'Reilly/Coulter/Kelly/Ingraham and Gretchen attended the same institutions.
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irishwxman | Jul 17, 2010, 05:49 PM EDT
SO basically Mr. Keane you are among the many looney moonbat leftys that think the wealthy are the reason for everybody's problems? Those horrible, evil stinking rich people? I think you are a chicken little. You are part of the problem.
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BrendanPKeane | Jul 17, 2010, 05:22 PM EDT
I believe in infrastructure. I believe taxes should be spent in-house. I believe the super-rich exploit our lobbying system, and that system threatens the Republican system established in the Constitution. I believe the super-rich escape taxation, and exploit harmful laws that has created a corporate welfare state that pays the resources which would have built our national infrastructure into the coffers of private and secretive interests. I believe O'Reilly focuses our attention on small fries, while covering and making excuses for his paymasters, that class of super-rich that routinely bankrupt our economy to secure more wealth and power for themselves.
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