In the regular “Policing the Net” segment of last night’s O’Reilly Factor, Bill O’Reilly used the example of a comment from the blog Hot Air to show the treatment Obama Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor is receiving from “bloggers.”
When I first read about this on a few conservative sites, I was angry. Then I actually watched the segment (video below).
O’Reilly’s take on the comment was that the poster must not live in the country or understand the system because the GOP has no way to block the pick. O’Reilly’s only comment on “Hussein” was to explain “that’s the President.” In all, it was pretty tame criticism during a segment that regularly tags blog speech as “hate speech.”
Allahpundit at Hot Air posted a defensive objection a couple of hours later, strangely focused on backing away from the “Hussein” portion of the comment although it was not addressed as being a problem by O’Reilly or guest Amanda Carpenter. I guess backing away from anything that could be considered disrespectful of Barack Obama is automatic at this point, even when it has nothing to do with anything.
Ah, there’s nothing like yanking a comment out of context and using it to smear the entire site, even though neither Ed nor I have ever referred to Obama as “Hussein.” Bonus points to O’R for referring to the comment in question as a “blog posting” even though it’s anything but.
I fail to see a ’smear’ here. I see an inaccuracy (referring to a comment as a blog posting), but O’Reilly did not address the use of “Hussein” except to explain it and focused on the accuracy of the comment’s content. Hot Air got pretty gentle treatment, especially in comparison to the other sites mentioned, Free Republic (“the roughest right-wing web site”), Daily Kos (“the most hateful web site in the country”) and Think Progress (“another crazy web site”).
In contrast, O’Reilly described Hot Air thusly:
This comes from Hot Air dot com.
Wow. I’d look into a defamation suit.
I guess it’s natural, when featured on the most popular news program on the most popular news channel in the nation, to want to extend the 15 minutes and generate a little buzz. The exit question by Hot Air’s Ed, “How guilty to hold Carpenter for not objecting more vociferously in Hot Air’s defense?” is a bit over the top, though. Obviously, Carpenter had no way to know whether the sentence came from a blog posting or a comment, and saw no reason to object to a ’smear’ that exists only in some fertile imaginations.
Here’s the segment:
Like That? You'll Probably Like These.
- Greta Van Susteren: Carl Cameron Regrets Palin Gossip Reports
- FOX May Air More Jackson Obama Slam Tape
- Laura Ingraham: PITA
- Hannity: Jesse Jackson Slams Obama on Tape
- FOX Hosts Gagged On Obama
