On Bill O'Reilly's "Media" Factor

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Dec 29, 2000

"What is said, right or wrong, can never really be taken back. Rebuttals never really offset the first bad impression. Lies take on a life of their own."--from page 38 of The O'Reilly Factor: The Good, the Bad, the Ridiculous in American Life by Bill O'Reilly of FOX News. Then he goes on to say that is why politicians running for office believe the negative campaign works. Usually, it does, but fortunately not always, or we would have Al Gore as President-elect, what with the nefarious Jesse Jackson's race-baiting advertising saying Dubya believes blacks are three-fifths of a person, or the bit about him being behind the wheel of the truck that was used to murder James Byrd in Jasper, Texas two years ago. (BTW, My family went through Jasper that December, and the blood was still there on the road they dragged him on!).

O'Reilly goes on to say that since the media can also "shape your opinions, behavior, tastes, and desires," one needs to learn all he can about how to use the media.

Last time, I wrote that the reason I doubt that the media will clean up its act or tone down its obvious political correctness now that Dubya will be in charge was because most media folks from the seventies on have gotten their degrees from left-wing media schools and were taught by professors just to the left of Karl Marx. Since I went to a college that really was to the left of Marx--SUNY Old Westbury, whose politically correct "mission" was to educate the "traditionally bypassed student" (read: minorities)--I have a right to say this, and since I worked on their student newspaper, The Catalyst I know what I am talking about.

Since O'Reilly works (for 25 years) in the mainstream media, however, his opinion is even more important. Read through pages 40-48 to discover that an idealistic young reporter out of college or grad school must learn to play (very dirty) office politics just to stay in the business; O'Reilly survived because his "attacks on government corruption and political hypocrisy" attract lots and lots of viewers and advertizing dollars--he has been in the business a long time and has built up a following, so he can get away with telling the truth. "For all I know, conformity is the best way to run Xerox..., but it is the death of truth-telling." (page 41)

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