| All content taken from The O'Reilly Factor on Fox News Channel. Each weeknight by 6 PM EST a preview of that evening's show will be posted and then updated with additional information the following weekday by noon EST.
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| "Things are getting very bad for the Obama administration. That's not a partisan statement, that is reality. The President's signature issue, 'affordable' health care, is not so affordable, and even if you want to sign up, the computer chaos makes it very hard to do so. But the main problem is President Obama himself. For years he's been saying to Americans that they would not have to undergo pain when health insurance changes, and the question now is whether the President knowingly misled the nation. Here's what I think happened: Mr. Obama brought little critical thinking to the table and pretty much talked himself into a scenario that he wanted; that is, that government can control the American health industry with little consumer downside. I'm not making excuses for the President, but at this point I am not willing to say he intentionally lied. Before you write me damning letters, what I'm saying is far more damaging than you think. As Talking Points said last night, the President simply answers that he doesn't know on too many occasions. It's your job to know, Mr. President, and being ill-informed puts all of us in danger. One of the weaknesses of liberal philosophy is idealism - liberals want certain things such as low-cost health care for everybody, but they don't calibrate the unintended consequences. For example, imposing 'social justice,' a big Obama theme, means somebody has to pay for it. No government can provide without resources and, because the government creates nothing, they have to take the resources away from people who have them. That's what we're seeing with the Obamacare chaos. Working Americans with individual policies will generally pay more in order to subsidize the 30-million uninsured Americans. President Obama was never upfront about that, and now millions of Americans are shocked. Talking Points believes President Obama will not recover from the health care debacle and that it will weigh Hillary Clinton down as well. The law never should have been passed, nobody really understood it, few read it, and the Supreme Court upheld the law on faulty reasoning. And now all of us are paying the price." |
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Guest: Charles Krauthammer
Dr. Charles Krauthammer gave his diagnosis of the President's predicament. "When it comes to foreign intelligence," he said, "everybody lies, it's understood. But when you're talking to your own people in trying to sell a program and you say something that is untrue so the law will pass, that is a real lie. The question is whether Obama knew that all these insurance plans would be canceled. It is an essential part of Obamacare that the government dictates what is supposed to be the correct level of coverage, it's the usual liberal arrogance and paternalism. I think Obama probably knew that this is an element of what he created." The Factor remained skeptical about the President's supposed lying: "You're saying that the President knew that what he was saying was not true and that it would be proven to be a lie. You're telling me a guy like Barack Obama is going to put himself out there for that kind of scorn?" |
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Guest: James Carville
For a Democratic perspective on the chaos in the health insurance market, The Factor turned to former Clinton aide James Carville. "President Obama could have made a more accurate statement," Carville conceded, "by saying you can keep your coverage as long as your policy meets the basic standards of the Affordable Care Act. I don't think he actually misled the nation, we always knew that under the act you had to have certain minimum requirements. And some people get subsidies, so when you say it costs more, that's not necessarily true. I think this will save the country an enormous amount of money." The Factor took Carville to the proverbial woodshed, saying, "You're pettifogging the issue, the bottom line is that the President of the United States misled the nation." |
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Guest: Bernie Goldberg
White House spokesman Jay Carney has been peppered with questions about what the President knew and when he knew it. Bernie Goldberg evaluated Carney's recent performance. "I once told you that Jay Carney reminds me of 'Baghdad Bob,' the clown who ran interference for Saddam Hussein," Goldberg said. "You said that was unfair, that he was just doing his job. So let's be clear about what his job is. His job is to make the President look good, and if that means he has to mislead the people or tell half-truths, he will do it. Some people may find that noble and loyal, but I don't!" Goldberg also questioned whether the media will continue their recent aggressive reporting. "The next big story is whether the President intentionally mislead the American people or did he not even know what was in his signature reform plan. Either he was incompetent or he lied, and I hope that is something the mainstream media begins digging into." |
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Guests: Kimberly Guilfoyle & Lis Wiehl
An Asian organization demanded that Pottery Barn stop selling Halloween costumes depicting a sushi chef and a woman in a kimono. Legal analysts Lis Wiehl and Kimberly Guilfoyle elaborated on the story. "This organization says the kimono is offensive," Wiehl reported. "I think it's elegant, but the organization said that if they were going to sue, they would sue for defamation. It's getting to the point where you can have nothing but animal costumes." Guilfoyle added, "They say there was intentional emotional distress because there was a Japanese flag on the costume." The Factor ridiculed the complaining group and denounced Pottery Barn for dropping the costumes: "Doesn't sushi emanate from Japan? Do I have the right to sue now if someone dresses as a leprechaun? And Pottery Barn gave into this!" |
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Guests: Monica Crowley & Alan Colmes
Under pressure from an atheist group, the Air Force Academy has decided to make the phrase "so help me God" an optional part of the cadet oath. The Factor asked Monica Crowley and Alan Colmes to opine. "The other military academies," Crowley said, "also have this as optional, so the Air Force Academy said they would do the same. I am not happy about this because I think they were subjected to an intimidation campaign by this religious freedom group. They put the screws to the Air Force, which caved into the pressure." Colmes theorized that many of the Founding Fathers would have sided with the atheists. "James Madison wanted separation of church and state, and Thomas Jefferson re-wrote the Bible with the miracles taken out. We're a secular country, there was no 'under God' oath until 1984." The Factor also defended the Air Force Academy's decision to make the religious oath optional, asking, "You can be an atheist in the military, so why do you have to say 'so help me God?'" |
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Bob Dickey, Woodinville, WA: "O'Reilly, the interview with Dick Cheney would have been better had you not interrupted. Too bad your ego got in the way as usual."
Molly Ogden, Bowling Green, OH: "Outstanding interview with Cheney. I found his attitude about his health uplifting."
Ruben Medellin, Moreno Valley, CA: "Pinning the vice president down with war statistics was smart and informative, Bill. The back and forth was very entertaining." |
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| Rob Lowe, who plays JFK in the upcoming TV version of "Killing Kennedy," will pay a visit to the No Spin Zone Wednesday night. |
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