Did Bill O’ and Geraldo Stage a Smackdown?
05 April 2007 10:15 pm by Taylor Marsh
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| VIDEO: Bill O’ v. Geraldo |
The skirmish over the presidential debate in Nevada made an impact. That’s my take on it. All you
have to do is look at the video above and you know Ailes’s public drubbing over
his Obama = Osama slur, plus the fact that Democrats not only stood strong, but pushed
back and scuttled the Fox sponsored debate made a difference, just maybe. There are few other reasons for O’Reilly’s freak out in the smackdown with Geraldo. Because any other time
on the Big O’s show he would have turned the guy’s mike off if he fought back
as hard as Geraldo. Lately there’s been a lot of pimping of the “fair and
balanced” slogan on Fox, more than usual that is, with this latest performance on O’Reilly being
the best result we’ve seen since local Nevada bloggers, Markos, MyDD, MoveOn.org and
many others activists at the local level said no to the Nevada Fox “News” debate.
I smell a stunt. Or at least it sure smacks of stagecraft.
It seems to me that anyone, especially O’Reilly, had to know what Geraldo’s
reaction would be to focusing on a drunk illegal immigrant, then turning it
towards the immigration issue in total, because Geraldo is a staunch supporter of undocumented
workers’ rights and Bill O’ is to the right of Lou Dobbs. Geraldo even got a slap in at the CNN anchor as well. O’Reilly’s position on (undocumented workers – illegal immigrants) is well known, as is Geraldo’s.
To me it was terrific theater and a well staged smackdown. After all, everyone
is now talking about it. It’s on all the blogs.
The other issue is that I remember Geraldo Rivera’s show on CNBC back in the
late 1990s during the impeachment nonsense. He was the only one on cable who
dared to push back on Kenneth Starr and the Republican Party’s gratuitous
voyeurism fetish, which cost this country plenty. I watched a lot of Geraldo’s CNBC show back in those days. It was the only place you could breathe and watch cable. Everybody else made
you want to throw a glass at the tube. This smackdown with Bill O’ reminded me of when Geraldo took a liberal view of an issue, which was to offer fair reporting on impeachment, with the event today looking like Fox setting up a wingnut and a qausi liberal, at least on the immigration issue, thus they were being “fair and balanced.”
As an aside, it was during impeachment when Keith Olbermann broke his MSNBC contract, which he’s talked about
before, because he just couldn’t cover the Clinton witch hunt anymore.
I could be wrong, but it sure isn’t the usual Bill O’ style. He never lets
anyone best him or play to a draw, not ever. If he’s losing he just
cuts the person’s mike off. But tonight Geraldo got to play the whole debate,
smackdown, screaming match, pissing contest, whatever you want to call it, all
the way out.
Honest debate playing out live on Fox “News” or was it a staged event
with two guys going at it? It’s also interesting this happens right after the Rove April Fools picture flap, which TRex lays out beautifully, if you don’t know about it. Although, the event that triggered the conversation is very sad and real. I offer the video above, you decide.
But if you’re watching Fox “News” lately and have been watching it
regularly there is the tiniest bit of evidence (and I do mean teeny tiny) that they got the message from
Democrats when the Nevada presidential debate was pulled from Fox’s grip; the indignity of which continued today
when the DNC refused to officially back the CBC Fox debates.
Or maybe all this is a coincidence? Could be, but either way it sure is fun to watch.
But remember, Fox “News” has been plummeting in the ratings. It wouldn’t be the first time a network started pulling out all the stops to get their viewers back. We love to watch train wrecks, don’t we?
