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The latest legal battle over a name: Fox News vs. Al Franken (1 Viewer)

Patrick_S

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I thought his book on Rush was a funny read so I'll read this one also. I can see why mindless "ditto heads" didn't like that book but what can you expect?

As for O'Reilly, it should be interesting if he tries to attack the book or just let it pass. If his past tendencies are any indication he's sure to try his best to discredit this book.

Regardless it should be interesting to see how he "spins" it.
 

Jesse Blacklow

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Chris, I refer you to Philip Hamm's post above. That and the fact that he is apparently has thinner skin than many single-celled organisms.
 

Joseph S

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He was known as a fine field reporter who's rise was hampered by his habit of always speaking his mind to the audience and his superiors.
I would think he would be hampered by his history of working for trash TV programs such as "A Current Affair," "Hard Copy," and "Inside Edition" and not his "speaking his mind."
 

Jay Heyl

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In keeping with the topic of "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them", I think it appropriate to point out that Bill O'Reilly spent six years working on "Inside Edition". While "Inside Edition" has always been an "infotainment" program, during O'Reilly's time with the show the emphasis was much more on the serious side; they did very few "trashy" stories. The last time I watched "Inside Edition", a couple anchor changes after O'Reilly left, it was difficult to tell "Inside Edition" from the other shows mentioned by Joseph, but such was not the case when O'Reilly was on the show.

According to his bio, O'Reilly has never worked for "A Current Affair" or "Hard Copy".
 

Patrick_S

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In keeping with the topic of "Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them", I think it appropriate to point out that Bill O'Reilly spent six years working on "Inside Edition". While "Inside Edition" has always been an "infotainment" program, during O'Reilly's time with the show the emphasis was much more on the serious side; they did very few "trashy" stories.
I think it's also appropriate to again emphasize that as the Washington Post article points out, "Inside Edition" won the Polk award a year AFTER Billie left.

So not is Billie confused about what award the show won, (he must have been confused since they both start with a P) he had absolutely nothing to do with the win.

By the way perhaps Billie should take some of his own advice (the NO SPIN crap) and stop trying to explain away his lying.

First, in his words, the Peabody is "the highest journalism award in the country" and then the Polk becomes "just as prestigious." Which one is it Billie? Both statements can't be true unless we have entered the dreaded SPIN ZONE. What a phony.
 

Ashley Seymour

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Does either party NOT have a vested interest in pursuing this issue by legal means? The whole legal issue is a smoke screen. Franken will sell a few more thousand books, and Fox will draw a few hundred thousand more viewers. I don't know what the marginal value of an additional book sale, or Fox viewer is, but both parties will make a lot more money. Kind of reminds me when Timothy Leary and G. Gordon Liddy went on the lecture circuit. They both debated and laughed all the way to the bank.
 

Jay Heyl

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Somehow I doubt O'Reilly and Franken are going to do the circuit together
On this I'm in complete agreement, though I never thought O'Reilly and James Carville would get within 100 yards of each other, yet they debated at the Panetta Institute and Carville subsequently appeared on O'Reilly's show. The difference, of course, is Carville, unlike Franken, can participate in a serious debate without doing a good impersonation of a deer in the headlights.

There are a lot of comedians who do political satire. Some aim their barbs primarily at one party or the other; others are equal opportunity satirists. But almost all of them, Franken and Moore excepted, seem to understand you can't be a political satirist and at the same time expect people to take you seriously when you discuss political issues. Franken would do better to just stick to the humor side of things. His talents there are clearly much greater than they are in the arena of serious political debate.
 

Ike

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Frankken was given 15 minutes to talk about his book, which is about pretty much what the title says it is. He used the time to rip into several well known right wingers, and since O'Reilly is on the cover and was conveniently seated to Frankken's left, he proceeded to tear into him as well, with much exuberance. He spent a good 20 minutes ripping on him (he went 35 mins total), while O'Reilly had to just sit there and take it. The look on O'Reilly's face told me he was ready to kill. After Frankken finished, O'Reilly yelled at Frankken for several minutes, followed by a "debate" that consisted of Frankken baiting O'Reilly and O'Reilly yelling back. A disgusted Molly Ivins, who was also present, got a few words in, but not many.
Just to clear this up:

Each person was given 15 minutes, with an intro before each speaker. Franken was third. I watched it on the stream available at CSpan, and he finished at the 48 minute mark. I'm assuming the others ran the full time. Franken ran a normal time.

Also, O'Reilly took the first shot. O'Reilly made a few snide comments during his speech which were direct shots. Later on, O'Reilly yelled for him to "Shut up!" That was the clip they showed on all the conservative news shows, to show how O'Reilly had beaten Franken.

O'Reilly's shots at Franken were about how in his book they wouldn't call people idiots or big fat... However, later, O'Reilly yells that Franken should sit down because he wouldn't understand what they were discussing. Franken never made fun of O'Reilly like that, instead using quotes from the media about the Peabody award.

It was really interesting to see the clips the "news analysis" shows showed to see how uninterested they were in presenting an accurate representation of what went down.

As for the suit, I don't see how this can help Fox News to be seen as more credible.
 

Joseph S

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"Inside Edition" and "A Current Affair" were in direct competition. O'Reilly went from ABC News to "Inside Edition" in 1989. He left in 1995 to attend Harvard. In 1996, the last year of production for "A Current Affair", he started at Fox News. I could find no evidence O'Reilly ever hosted "A Current Affair", discounting obviously incorrect citations that confused "A Current Affair" with "Inside Edition". The two shows were produced by different companies, so it seems very unlikely O'Reilly would have appeared on "A Current Affair" while working on "Inside Edition".
He most certainly worked for both. "A Current Affair" was around many years before "Inside Edition" and was one of the first if not the first trash program. O'Reilly, O'Boyle, Povich, and a bunch of others in the tabloid/trash tv business got their start there. He also popped up on local tv as well several times as a fillin.
 

Matt Birchall

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Can you provide a URL?
http://www.booktv.org/feature/index....30&schedID=196

I've seen this several times now, and the last time I watched it, I actually took notes on it, to get an idea of the length of the individual speeches, because I'm a big nerd (and I don't even follow these types of things all that much--just found it humorous). Anyway, here's what I've got (seconds are rounded):

0:00-3:45 - Introduction by Pat Schroeder
3:45-16:00 - Molly Ivins (12 minutes total)
16:00-17:30 - Schroeder introduces Bill O'Reilly
17:30-26:30 - Bill O'Reilly (9 minutes total)
26:30-28:30 - Schroeder introduces Al Franken
28:30-48:30 - Al Franken (20 minutes total)
48:30-1:30:00 - All hell breaks loose :)

O'Reilly's lowlights:

From his speech:

"(I'm) trying to elevate the discourse."
"We name names, we don't call names." (this one, given the context, is especially poetic)

To Franken, after Franken's time:

"Idiot."
"You're pathetic."
"SHUT UP! YOU HAD YOUR 35 MINUTES! SHUT UP!"
"Al, you had 45 minutes up here."

About Franken:

"He's a vicious-and that's with a capital V-person, blinded by ideology."

But, remember that Bill doesn't "call names".

Watching O'Reilly, as he sat, pouty-faced and arms-folded, through the duration of Franken's speech, was almost as funny as what Franken was saying himself.

He was obviously angry that Franken was openly-mocking him like that, for all to see, all the while getting much bigger laughs than anything O'Reilly himself said in his allotted time. His lashing out at Franken at the end of Franken's time just kind of exemplified the type of person that he is in general.

Enjoy!
 

Jesse Blacklow

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Need more evidence O'Reilly isn't "balanced"? Check out this quote from his show afterwards:
In the old west, that woulda got you shot. See in the old west, and I woulda loved to have been in the old west, Al and I woulda just had a little, uh, a little shootout. You know? We woulda went out, on Wilshire Avenue, and uh, six shooters, now he's a much smaller target than I am, about four foot eleven, but he's wider, and it woulda been you know, Clint Eastwood time. I woulda had the cheroot, the serape, woulda given my squint, and I woulda put a bullet right between his head. Woulda been wrong, woulda been wrong, but it was the old west, and I would not have known any better, so I wouldn't have been held accountable because I would not have known any--now I do, now in 2003 that would have been wrong.
Now really, does that sound like something from the "No-Spin Zone"?
 

Patrick_S

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The timing of the whole thing is also hard to determine. It's clear the award was given out in 1996, but without further information it's difficult to say when work began on the "Door to Door Insurance" segment that won the award. It's possible O'Reilly was still with "Inside Edition" when work on the segment began.
If he had anything what so ever to do with the segment he would gleefully mention that at ever opportunity and who would blame him? If he had worked on the segment he should mention it but the reality is he can't because he knows those who did create the segment would expose him in a heartbeat.

I think it's safe to say the Billie has been SPINING all a long and he doesn't know the definition of the word hypocrisy.
 

Patrick_S

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Fox News' viewership is small? Compared to what?
Well yes the number of people who watch Fox is very small but if you want to compare look at the rating for nightly news on CBS, NBC and ABC.

As CharlesD already posted Fox's number one show is watched by just over a million viewers. The nightly news on the major networks all get over ten million viewers each.

The reality is Fox doesn't have millions of viewers now and it won't gain millions from this publicity lawsuit. That's the only point I was making.
 

Jay Heyl

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Bottom line is he had NOTHING to do with the award and his mentioning of it as proof of the shows quality is wrong.
How is it wrong? If I say that the Boy Scouts of America is a fine, upstanding organization because Scouts help little old ladies across the street, how does the fact that I never helped a little old lady across the street when I was a Scout negate my statement? I've been unable to find the transcript of the C-Span interview with O'Reilly from which Franken got the Peabody/Polk thing, but everything I've read about it, including synopses of Franken's remarks, indicates O'Reilly's comment was made in support of "Inside Edition" as a quality program and not one of the trashy tabloid journalism shows. If such is the case, his mention of the Peabody/Polk award is entirely justified and appropriate. He wasn't trying to claim a personal stake in the award; he was simply using it as evidence that "Inside Edition" is a serious show. The fact that he mixed up the Polk and the Peabody is unfortunate, but it's hardly like saying you graduated from Harvard when you never even got out of high school. Both the Peabody and the Polk are prestigious journalism awards for which most reporters would gladly give up their first born. The fact that O'Reilly was no longer with the show when the award was won only goes to strengthen his claim that he simply misspoke and did not intentionally attempt to inflate the prestige of the award.

As I said earlier, I'm not an O'Reilly fan. I used to watch his show regularly, but I couldn't take his intractable, unreasonable positions on certain issues. Several times I saw him grab hold of something that in truth didn't amount to much, but he knew it would play well to the audience so he pushed the issue for all he was worth. So, no, I don't really care for O'Reilly. That said, I think he has a point that it's pretty sad that Franken puts him on the cover of his book under that "... Lying Liars..." title, and the best Franken can come up with is that O'Reilly confused the Polk Award with the Peabody Award.

Also, just for the sake of accuracy, here are some news viewership numbers from a Seattle Times article dated April of this year and covered viewership during the first week of the most recent conflict in Iraq. Fox News averaged 4.4 million viewers. ("The O'Reilly Factor" was Fox's most watched show, pulling 5.4 million viewers.) CNN averaged 3.7 million viewers. MSNBC averaged 1.9 million. "NBC Nightly News" averaged 11.2 million. "ABC World News Tonight" averaged 10.3 million. CBS averaged 8 million. Please note these numbers are somewhat larger than would be expected for a more normal time, but I couldn't find more recent numbers (other than reports of "CBS Evening News" viewership dropping into the sixes.) For the quarter ended 30 June 2003, Fox News viewership in prime time rose 92% and 24 hour viewership more than doubled. (This last bit was from a Dow Jones Newswire report on News Corp earnings. It wasn't clear from the source if these are improvements over the previous quarter or over the same quarter in the previous year. Given the level of change, I'd guess the latter.)
 

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