Tuesday, September 25, 2007
On The O'Reilly Factor...
Segment Summaries
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.
Talking Points Memo & Top Story
CNN moves over to the dark side
"Every weekday we do three hours of commentary: two on the radio and one on TV. And every day the far-left smear website Media Matters takes that commentary out-of-context and feeds defamation out to the public. Elements at NBC News have made a living parroting Media Matters garbage. And now, sadly, CNN has jumped into the swamp. Recently on the Radio Factor, I did an hour on how racism is dumb. We didn't hear one complaint about the show that ran on more than 400 radio stations. But yesterday Media Matters distorted the entire conversation and implied I was racist for condemning racism. Stunningly, CNN echoed the defamation on at least three programs. Talking Points has said many times on this broadcast that we respect CNN, but this is absurd. Failure leads to desperation. The Factor has been number one for six consecutive years and defeats all our cable news competition, combined. The other cable news outlets are ratings disasters. Last night the Factor had six times as many viewers as CNN at 8PM. But that is no excuse for being dishonest."

For more on the topic, The Factor brought in Juan Williams, who was a guest on the Radio Factor that hour. "It's frustrating. They want to shut you up. They want to shut up anybody who has an honest discussion about race." Williams was astonished, agreeing that the conversation he participated in was nothing like CNN or MSNBC had characterized it. "CNN has joined NBC News in parroting far left propaganda in an attempt to destroy Fox News Channel and to deceive their viewers," The Factor warned. "I've never seen anything like this in the media." Williams pointed out that the media outlets completely missed the larger context of the conversation: "You said stereotypes are not true... it had nothing to do with racist ranting by anybody, except these idiots at CNN."

News Link: Audio: Listen to O'Reilly's full commentary
Unresolved Problems Segment
Left-wing condemns Ahmadinejad speech
Left-wing condemns Ahmadinejad speech/New book about culture wars
Radio host and New York Times number-one bestselling author Laura Ingraham joined The Factor to offer her take on the left-wing reaction to the Ahmadinejad speech at Columbia University. "The left's hatred of Bush leads them to do all sorts of crazy things... they're so infuriated about Bush and the war in Iraq that they don't turn out in droves to protest someone like Ahmadinejad - they give him polite applause." The Factor thinks that Ahmadinejad is at least slightly comical. "He's a clown, but he's a dangerous clown." Next, Ingraham talked about her new book "Power to the People," which tackles America's ongoing culture war. "So many people feel helpless and hopeless to change what they see as a culture slipping into the sewage every day. What I try to do in this book is give people a pathway to change the culture." The Factor was a major fan of the cause: "I'm a culture warrior too. We have to fight the good fight."

News Link: Iranian prez speaks at UN
Factor Follow Up Segment
Criminal alien kills Phoenix police officer
After an illegal immigrant killed a police officer, Joe Garcia, a columnist for the Arizona Republic wrote that anti-immigrant "extremists" were "exploiting" the situation. He came onto The Factor to defend his column. "I'm not against border security... as long as we're not going after an illegal immigrant just because of the color of their skin," Garcia said. "The government has a right to know who you are," The Factor argued. "The law-abiding illegal aliens have to register." The Factor must have been convincing, because Garcia ended the segment on a conciliatory note: "I think you and I agree more than we disagree."

News Link: Joe Garcia op-ed
"Is it Legal?" Segment
Juror bounced in Warren Jeffs trial
Juror bounced in Warren Jeffs trial/no charges for woman with dead babies in backyard
Lis Wiehl and Megyn Kelly came to offer analysis of the booted juror in the Warren Jeffs case. Kelly seemed to think that it wasn't much of an issue: "The bottom line is they got the right verdict. They got a guilty verdict, and this guy's going to go away for a long time." The Factor was worried about a "nutty judge" letting Jeffs off easy. "If he was in Vermont, he'd probably get off with probation." Next, the ladies tried to explain the woman in Maryland with babies found buried in her backyard - the prosecutor declined to bring charges. Wiehl was horrified, but understood the prosecution's side "This case is killing me. I want to see it go to trial... But the grand jury is not with this prosecutor," making it extremely difficult to prosecute.

News Link: Polygamist leader found guilty

News Link: Christy Freeman found not guilty
Back of Book Segment
Great American Culture Quiz
It was a stellar performance by both Martha MacCallum and Steve Doocy on the weekly Culture Quiz. MacCallum and Doocy both knew the name of the actor who was present when Natalie Wood died, which American President worked in Major League Baseball, the name of the actor from the TV show "The Fugitive," the name of the singer who sang the theme from "Goldfinger," and the band that performed "Power of Love" from the movie "Back to the Future." After this amazing run, The Factor was forced to come up with a tiebreaker. Neither of them knew the answer to the tiebreaker, so the score stood at 5 out of 6 for both of them.
Pinheads and Patriots
Who's helping, and who's hurting?
Tuesday's Patriot: Alan Sears, the head of the Alliance Defense Fund, a legal group dedicated to fighting the ACLU. And the Pinhead: Actor Kevin Spacey, who went to Venezuela and spent three hours visiting and being photographed with the country's anti-American leader Hugo Chavez.

News Link: Kevin Spacey dines with Hugo Chavez
Factor Mail
Viewers sound off
Michael Bresnahan, Seaford, New York
"Mr. O'Reilly, it is obvious that Iran is helping kill Americans in both Iraq and Afghanistan and that they are developing a nuclear weapon. Why would anyone want the USA to leave the Middle East with that kind of danger in play?"

Erez Shamir, Israel
"The President of Iran says there are no homosexuals in his country and that there is no development of a nuclear weapon. I don't believe him."

Jojo Vicencio, the Philippines
"I'm glad he got exposure. His plan of selling his ideology fizzled."

Jodie Miller, Ojai, California
"It looked like Janeane Garofalo had to choose between buying shampoo and getting a tattoo."