nodeerforamonth

Franken is famous (infamous?) for saying stuff like "Well my facts are from this report... you didn't read it?" And no such report exists! He just makes it up!

Just because some website prints up a list of "lies" that someone says (on both the left and right), doesn't mean it's true!

run1

I have to say that the Letterman-O'Reilly "showdown" (or whatever you want to call it) came across as a variation of a scenario I've seen before. Only then it's O'Reilly in the Letterman-role. Basically It goes something like this:
Bill invites someone on the show that he makes very clear that he dislikes, let them have the opening statement (while he's rolling his eyes, sighing etc), tells them they're wrong, and goes off on a rant. The guest/victim is lucky to be able to complete 2 full sentences without interruption after the opening statement.
So in that respect I don't think Bill has all that much to complain about.
Thing is, I don't really dislike O'Reilly that much either. As long as he's staying away from his rabid ranting persona he's able to present an issue quite intelligently. I end up disagreeing with him 80% of the time, but considering he's a pround conservative and I'm not, that's hardly surprising. Now, if he could just give up on the whole notion that he's "fair" and present issues without "spin"......

wmansir

Perhaps you should watch the clip at the beginning of this thread again. I have absolutely no doubt that everyone in the audience (and millions at home) had their eyes glued on letterman when he quite deliberately took a pencil, stirred it around in the guests cup and then tapped it off into the cup before announcing O'Reilly. If nobody noticed it why do you think the audience laughed when O'Reilly drank from his cup?

dolphinboy

Actually, he's not and you won't be able to cite one non-partisan person or group who has claimed that. He's had to make one correction in all of his books. For a second, I thought you were talking about Ann Coulter, who is famous for things like that. Bill has done it too. Here's a clip of Bill talking about THE Swedish study that doesn't exist. Come back with me with proof that the study actually does exist.

O'Reilly makes up study that doesn't exist


If you're so inclined to want to know the truth, you can take something someone has posted as a lie from his show, usually it's listed in quotes, then you compare it to the transcript of the show. If he didn't say it, then it was made up. If you find proof that he said something that was called a lie that wasn't, then you know for sure. Kind of simple, really.

dolphinboy

Yet not one of Bill's loyal producers noticed this and played it back for him or told him about it. He played most of the interview on this television show and you think he wouldn't show that if he that there was something to it? Please.

Ketamine

No shit? She is an American citizen? What was I thinking?

Where did I say she couldn't speak her mind? She can say whatever the hell she wants. Grieve, be pissed off. etc., but don't expect me to see her as anything more than a bitter, uneducated mother who is out of her mind after the loss of her son. She herself has said that she has lost most of her family and her friends because they think what she is doing is wrong. That says a lot to me. She does not speak for her son and does not speak for her family.

Disagree with the war; I don't have a problem with that. Spout off hate filled speeches daily and then blame the president of the United States for not wanting to meet her for a 2nd time? Who in their right mind would meet with someone like that?

Her son was an adult and joined the military on his own and she was even unhappy that he did that. President Bush did not make him join the military. President Bush did not murder her son. He died doing something he believed in and IMHO, Sheehan is dishonoring her son and the family agrees with my opinion.

Ketamine

Come on. You don't think it was low of Letterman to do that and was meant to show what he thinks of his next guest? You think he would do something like this next time Tom Hanks is on? You personally wouldn't be pissed off if you found out that someone stuck something in your drink before you walked on stage? My guess is that Bill didn't want to dignify that action by bringing it up. Of course there is no physical danger to Bill and it isn't like he pissed in it, but the intent was the same. It was cheap and Letterman doesn't need to resort to such things.

Tracer Bullet

If I remember correctly (which I admit I may not be, as it's been about three years since I've watched this particular clip) Franken spoke for approximately 15 minutes, most of which was a detailed refutation of O'Reilly's Peabody win claim.

O'Reilly gets up to speak and just lets loose a steady stream of insults and personal attacks. Should Franken not have interrupted him? Probably.

If anything, O'Reilly is a master at misdirection. Instead of defending himself (which was impossible) he started in on Franken knowing full well that he would interrupt O'Reilly, thus negating Franken's comments.

bboisvert

OK, I found this after about 2 minutes on Google:

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Conten...3/660zypwj.asp

Agree with it or not, it seems to be quoting many statistics (that came from a study of Sweden/Denmark) that seem to back up O'Reilly's point. I have no idea what the date of this clip is, or what specific study he was talking about... but it certainly seems that there are "studies" out there.

Goldberg74

"... isn't this the kind of thing, like once or twice every 20 years somebody gets outraged and says, 'Oh by God we gotta put diapers on horses.'" - David Letterman to Bill O'Reilly about the Happy Holidays/Merry Christmas controversy

JumpCutz

A link to some of O'Reilly's purported lies....

http://www.oreilly-sucks.com/rememberarchive.htm

Count Dooku

Ketamine posted
Later Ketamine posted
Okay. Y'see what you're doing there is you're defending her actions.

and Ketamine also posted
Cindy Sheehan's son (I don't know his name) went to Iraq because he was in the military and he was ordered to go there and he followed those orders.

You don't know, I don't know, and nobody who's gonna post in this forum knows, if he believed in "the mission".

dolphinboy

What specific study of Sweden is mentioned in this article? The writer mentions a person may be involved with research but then goes on to simply give that person's opinion, not any citation of an actual study that can be cited and examined by the readers. I like how the writer calls it de facto gay marriage in Denmark hoping no one will distinguish between actual, legal gay marriage in Sweden, which O'Reilly said exists.

The Danish study mentioned on page 2 doesn't state anything about gay marriage, unless the author left that out which seems unlikely. It simply argues that out of wedlock parenting was a bad thing.

But:

Although Sweden leads the world in family decline, the United States is runner-up. Swedes marry less, and bear more children out of wedlock, than any other industrialized nation. But Americans lead the world in single parenthood and divorce. If we bracket the crisis of single parenthood among African-Americans, the picture is somewhat different. Yet even among non-Hispanic whites, the American divorce rate is extremely high by world standards.

Another researcher mentioned linked the Swedish marriage decline with the welfare society. Not gay marriage.

On top of that, the only real study that gets mentioned, which the writer points out was unpublished, disagrees with what the writer believes by giving his opinion and analysis of the the research. What makes this person better qualified to present the statistics? He's simply taking one set of data and giving his own un-qualified opinion about what the numbers mean.

Some of the numbers showed marriage had gone up, but the writer doesn't like that and says it has something to do with "older people" catching up because that doesn't fit his argument that gay marriage is to blame for marriage rates going down...even if they go up.

Overall, even the people who seem to believe there is a problem with marriage don't link it to gay marriage, but other factors.

Not surprised you needed to go to the Weekly Standard for proof that there was actually a specific Swedish Study O'Reilly clearly is pulling out of his butt. If it existed, it wouldn't be found in a liberal or conservative paper.

I still see no sociological study from Sweden. O'Reilly was being VERY specific, he didn't state Scandanavia or Denmark. He says THEY did a sociological study in Sweden. Who's they? What study was he talking about?

Count Dooku

It's not trivial. The Peabody is the most prestigious award in broadcast journalism. The Polk is very much not.
O'Reilly had been claiming for years that he had won a Peabody, and maintained that claim even when he was confronted by guests on The Factor who said he had not won a Peabody.

A good analogy would be if Actor X claimed to have won an Oscar, when all he had really won was a Golden Globe.
There's a big difference between the two, and Actor X knows that difference.

The whole point of the deception is to claim a stature in your profession that you do not have.

And I like it that in your quote, you repeat O'Reilly's response that he was just "mistaken".
What would you say, Mr. Red Sox Nation, if Derek Jeter went around for years claiming that he had won the League MVP when he really had only won the All-Star Game MVP?

dolphinboy

I would believe him if he told me that he was "mistaken" despite the fact that of all people he should know the difference and the fact that a number of people had corrected him and he continued to repeat that he was the League MVP anyway.

dolphinboy

It is kind of funny how many people think that Letterman "proved" that he didn't know anything, when he was constantly being sarcastic and making jokes and clearly just didn't want to argue with someone like O'Reilly.

I like how the OP on onegoodmove, which has the video clip of the O'Reilly-Letterman exchange, put it.

"You don't debate with someone who has no respect for the facts, or someone who quotes out of context. You point out as Dave did that it is crap. You don't argue the fine points you can never win that sort of argument with a LIAR. When someone flings sh*t like O'Reilly does, you don't need to identify it point by point, you can smell it."

bboisvert

I think it's pretty obvious that I'd be outraged, put an unflattering picture of Jeter on the cover of my book, and then spent months milking the story on the talk show circuit to increase sales.

Count Dooku

By the way, I think it's fairly obvious what Letterman's opinion of O'Reilly is,
and that Letterman is familiar with the charges that O'Reilly is a habitual "misrepresenter"
because Al Franken --O'Reilly's most fervent and outspoken critic, is so frequently a guest on Letterman.

Ketamine

That the best you can do? What I was doing is saying while she can say what she wants, I can still think she is crazy. She has taken the anti-war thing to a much different level than most people who are against the war. Those people who are against the war I respect their opinion though disagree with it. I just think Sheehan is crazy, but she can say what she wishes (as long as it is also ok for me to say IMHO she is batshit crazy).

I think the family knew what he wanted. She is now an outcast in the family for her actions and while I don't know 100% that he was fighting for a cause he believed in, I do know that he was an adult and signed himself up for the military.

SkullOrchard

I've been a diehard Letterman fan since the late 70's, but Dave really lost a sizable chunk of my admiration and respect with the way he handled himself during that interview. I like Letterman a Hell of a lot better than I like O'Reilly, but Bill was the clear winner in that verbal exchange.

Count Dooku

That's all I needed to do.
In your own postings you've (1) contradicted yourself, or
(2) established in your own words that you are "either crazy or they don't know what she has done and said in the last 6 months."

"the family knew what he wanted." --There is absolutely, absolutely, absolutely no evidence to establish, or even support, the veracity of that statement.

Casey Sheehan was an adult with free will who volunteered to serve in the military. (I think it's terrific that you keep saying that.)

Nothing about that true statement implies or indicates that Casey Sheehan believed that the war (he was fighting) was being waged for good reasons, or that he agreed with Bush's position that the US needed to invade Iraq... for any reason.

If Casey Sheehan believed that Bush was a filthy liar who deceived the American people, and that the war in Iraq was a completely misguided fiasco that never should have been started in the first place, much less continued with no end in sight... And there is absolutely no way for anyone living to establish that he did not believe that... Then Cindy Sheehan is most definitely honoring her son.

And as I have just demonstrated, you don't know the first part of that to be true, your opinion is not supported by any producable evidence, and the family is IMHO delusional.

lucasorion

pretty interesting stuff regarding the war on christmas here:
http://mediamatters.org/issues_topics/war_on_christmas
- including the truth behind O'Reilly's assertion on Letterman that they're trying to kill "Silent Night".
Also, O'Reilly said on his show the next day that a poll showed that 69 percent of Americans agree with him that there is a war on Christmas. The poll actually just asked people whether they prefer the phrase "Merry Christmas" or "Happy Holidays" and 69 percent prefer the former. 80% of Americans are Christian so that number seems a little low. I'm not what I would call a Christian, though I do celebrate Christ's birth (and life) because I think he was an amazing teacher, and I probably only ever say "Merry Christmas" - not that I'm running around spouting that out like George Bailey.

Michael Ballack

Oh, Poor Bill was just mistaken about Silent Night. I wish there was a smile face with the whole jerking hand motion that people make for bullshitters like Bill.

Ketamine

Go ahead and continue to repeat yourself if you think that is working for you. If you think me saying she is batshit crazy in her views, but has a right to her opinion is a contradiction, so be it. I don't see the contradiction. You also did a super job of taking a sentence out of context to try to prove a point (which you still failed at doing). Go back and read the whole thing.

Meaning if you disagree with the war and can have an intelligent, civil conversation about it then I will listen and respect your opinion. If you spout off half the shit she has been saying in the last 6 months, then you are batshit crazy and I don't have time to waste with your nonsense. She can still say what she wants, she doesn't deserve the time that she is getting.




If you want to believe one person over many in the family as far as Casey's feelings then have at it. I would guess that isn't using the soundest logic, but go ahead and knock yourself out. Cindy in her own words has said that she lost most of her friends and family over her actions regarding her son. Why do you think that is? Really, give me a more logical reason than she is right and they are all wrong. They are unhappy because they think she is going against her son's wishes in her actions and she is dishonoring him with her actions. Do I know this 100%? Of course not b/c I was not Casey or a friend of his. It would reason that the next closest thing to knowing what his thoughts were would be to see what his family and friends would say. Cindy is standing alone now which leads me to think she is on the side opposite of what her son wanted. I could be wrong though but come on and use some common sense here.

For those interested here is one statement the family made to the press. I think it is pretty clear what they think of Cindy Sheehan and her actions.

Sheehan Family Statement:

The Sheehan Family lost our beloved Casey in the Iraq War and we have been silently, respectfully grieving. We do not agree with the political motivations and publicity tactics of Cindy Sheehan. She now appears to be promoting her own personal agenda and notoriety at the expense of her son’s good name and reputation. The rest of the Sheehan Family supports the troops, our country, and our President, silently, with prayer and respect.

Sincerely,

Casey Sheehan’s grandparents, aunts, uncles and numerous cousins.

Poopoo this all you want but if you think Cindy's opinion is important in regard to Casey and his wishes then I think you have to consider what the rest of the family has to say.

AlainDelon

I'm still not really clear on Dolphinboy's position on the pencildipping incident.Did he not see it like everyone else or does Letterman do this with every guest or is it not a big deal if it happened?And why did the audience laugh when Bill drank from his cup?For some other reason than Letterman stirring Bill's drink with a pencil?I agree it's not a huge deal either way it just seems childish for two guy's in their 50's.