In a heated exchange, Jones tries hard to defend Carroll. But facts aren’t much use on Factor, as O’Reilly demands to know, “Who do you have on the right to counter John Carroll?”
“I’m a watchdog,” O’Reilly declares triumphantly before abruptly ending the segment.
In an interview after that encounter, Jones explains that “Bill has a deep-seated anger at me personally because I gave Al Franken a fellowship.”
“Bill is Bill,” he adds, philosophically. “I know going on this show I’m going to be accused and yelled at. I think on his program, it’s important to accuse and yell back.”
Facing down Factor
There is, of course, plenty of debate about whether O’Reilly’s arched eyebrows, wagging finger, and moral certitude are a shrewdly concocted act or the real deal. But maybe it doesn’t even matter.
“People believe what I’m saying is true,” asserted the self-proclaimed populist in an interview a few years ago. “And I trust the folks.” (A spokeswoman for the show declined to comment for this story.)
O’Reilly’s infamous bullying tactics were memorably captured in Robert Greenwald’s 2004 documentary Outfoxed, in which he is seen berating and silencing guests who take issue with him. Perhaps the most famous encounter of that kind was a nasty and insulting February 2003 interview with Jeremy Glick — an anti-war activist and son of a 9/11 victim — in which O’Reilly informed his guest that his late father would disapprove of his actions, told him to “shut up,” and then declared it was time to “cut his mike.”
On other occasions, however, when he’s moved up in weight to tackle more formidable foes, O’Reilly’s larger-than-life persona suffers from some — to use George Costanza’s memorable term — “shrinkage.”
In a much-hyped debate with Michael Moore during the 2004 Democratic Convention, O’Reilly was clearly wary of the sharp-witted lefty filmmaker and lacked his usual bravado. Bolstered by his long experience as a talk-TV host, Phil Donahue whacked O’Reilly around but good last fall when they debated anti-war mom Cindy Sheehan on Factor. (At one point, when O’Reilly noted that his nephew had just enlisted in the service and then threatened to “boot [his guest] right off the set,” Donahue retorted: “I’m not Jeremy Glick, Billy. You can’t intimidate me.”)
Most recently, O’Reilly saw the tables turned during a January 3 appearance on the Late Show with David Letterman when the usually affable late-night comic — no doubt speaking for many Americans — told his guest that “I have the feeling about 60 percent of what you say is crap.”
However accurate Letterman’s math, O’Reilly can make life very difficult for guests who aren’t quite in the Letterman and Donahue league.
David Brock, president of the liberal watchdog group Media Matters for America — which is frequently critical of O’Reilly and gave him its 2004 “Misinformer of the Year” award — says, “I often feel he’s also getting a fair amount of guests who are lured on to that show for a one-time appearance and then get the stuffing beaten out of them.” (Now, in an apparent search for more cannon fodder, O’Reilly is promising to fly “six lucky Factor viewers” to the show if they send an e-mail making the case that they can hold their own against the host.)
