Looks like the whole Lying, Liars" meme from Franken's book fits the little clown as well as anyone else when it comes to knowing what you're saying is true. I'm not a huge O'Reilly fan - but I detest the little troll Franken. He wants to tear anything down he can, then doesn't even have the class to apolgize when he's wrong - just passes it off as more schtick.
This clown doesn't give a damn about America, or her politics - just his own very short-sighted agenda and self-promotion. People that wonder or complain about the situation the country is in, then spend their time listening to dopes like this are just as foolish and ultimately dangerous.
Sometimes I get in a bad mood and could swear we're either shooting the wrong people, or just not enough of the right ones.
Oh, don't worry - that's just a joke. Right?
The two have often tussled on-air, since Franken launched his radio program in 2004, then called "The O'Franken Factor." He also wrote a book attacking Fox and O'Reilly.
Friday, Franken quoted O'Reilly recalling his Levittown days in a 2000 New York Observer article: "You don't come from any lower than I came from on an economic scale."
Franken then quoted a subsequent Washington Post article in which O'Reilly's mother said the family was from Westbury. "This would make him what we call ..." Franken began. "A liar!" the crowd replied.
But when Franken interviewed Hofstra professor and Levittown expert Barbara Kelly on the air, he learned there was no lie to uncover.
O'Reilly, Kelly declared, had grown up in Levittown, in an area that overlapped with the outskirts of Westbury.
"Well," Franken said, a hint of disappointment in his voice, "maybe he's just kind of ... [fooling], could that be it?"
Franken is a creepy mutant, anyone that pays attention to him is doing themselves a disservice
Hes a no talent loser
Posted by: ProudAmerican | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 02:06 PM
O'Reilly, Kelly declared, had grown up in Levittown, in an area that overlapped with the outskirts of Westbury.
"Well," Franken said, a hint of disappointment in his voice, "maybe he's just kind of ... [fooling], could that be it?"
Posted by Dan in Media Bias | Permalink
They are both just two sides of the same coin...but it works, because people are "entertained" by the "issues,"--none of which ever get resolved. Kinda neat...if you're the one in control.
Posted by: TheAlamo | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 02:07 PM
While i am no huge fan of oreily either, i just dont see it that way.. Oreily will listen to another perspective.. Franken just doesnt listen.. i mean have you heard this guy on the radio?? no wonder they have borrow money to pay the bills
Posted by: ProudAmerican | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 02:19 PM
Personally, I think he's just a less effective reflection of the smear-meisters on the conservative talk shows. I don't think Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, or Bill O'Reilly care about America any more than Al Franken. They are all just out to try to forward their agenda to make more money and gain more fame. When it comes to alternative view points, Franken doesn't listen, Coulter and Hannity don't listen, Limbaugh doesn't listen, and O'Reilly mostly pretends to listen.
I say throw all the bums out and give me back Cronkite and Murrow.....god I sound like a cranky old fart!
Posted by: festicles | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 02:33 PM
Posted by: festicles | Oct 30, 2005 2:33:42 PM
Cronkite was the biggest phoney of them all!!
I miss jennings...
Posted by: ProudAmerican | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 02:40 PM
festicles, i hear ya! and i'm not cranky nor old. real journalism is missing from our world (except for poor old helen thomas) and look where it's gotten her? franken is a comedian, oreilly? well apparently, a lech, but journalist? not by a long shot.
Posted by: lawbster | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 02:53 PM
Yikes. Does that mean I'm on the hit list, too?
Al Franken's political credentials come from Saturday Night Live...... And his parody of modern politics /journalistic credibility, is just too funny. Yeah Dan, shoot 'em. Shoot me too for laughing, please.
Only I don't quite see how this everyday punditry has anything to do with national security and/or bending/manufacturing reality to take an argument for war, to the American people. Laughter is the best antidote for fear, but no one is voting Al for President here or Secretary of Defense. We're all afraid and frustrated, sometimes. I don't particularly like drinking myself into a stupor. But you're entitled to your own choice of release.... as long as it's still legal. And Al is fair game.
BTW, One of my best friends came from Levittown, lol. He's a great guy, so what's the big deal..... Can't get more middle america than a utopian planned community.
Posted by: callmeBetty | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 03:04 PM
WhateverDan.What about your hero Rush.If we started to list all the crap and hate that he spews out we would run out of space.I think Franken is hilarious.Its ok when the right attacks.But when the left does it they are bombthrowers.Get a life
Posted by: hecrow | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 03:14 PM
If Al Franken were only unpleasant to listen to when talking with or about O'Reilly I would not bother to post. However, this man has some major problems and maybe they stem from his own low self image. MO...he has not done anything to improve it. Once he got out front with political views and started pushing them he got out of control and any interest in him as a humorist or author or even as a guess panelist is mute. JMO
Posted by: Pearl | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 04:45 PM
What about your hero Rush
UH, hero? SInce when. He's an entertainer and most of what he ahd to say to me he said in his first book. Cant say as I have listened to his show in years, frankly. When either he or Hannity get going, more hannity than Rush, I just shuit him off. Sean is far too shrill and uninformed for me. So what's your point, besides making another baseless allegation?
Posted by: Dan | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 05:24 PM
I am disgusted with Hannity. His roots are in lower to middle "middle class". O'Reilly, I can take or leave. Westbury or Levittown, so what? Now if it were Old Westbury, that would be another story. Both of these guys started out lower to middle "middle class" and their notoriety has brought them into the "upper exchelon". It seems to me that their entrance into the "upper exchelon" has also served to cloud their memories. These guys are so far removed from their roots now, they can't even see those roots anymore.
I do not like Al Franken at all. Mostly because, while oftimes funny, his humor shows, more often than not, his lack of expertise on any subject at all. Where did he get his education? Somewhere along the line he heard have an opinion. He forgot the word "informed".
Posted by: bizarre | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 05:39 PM
we're definitely not shooting enough people, and lot of people getting killed are the wrong ones. al needs to go in the next batch,just in front of the aclu.
Posted by: dennisintn | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 06:17 PM
Al Franken - I know him from Saturday night live, a comedian. Thought he was funny. a bit silly, but could never see him as someone I would take seriously.
But Rush - he's caustic, toxic, and just plain gross, and spouts off misinformation, but not in the way of a comedian. Cannot relate to his following or imagine that anyone could be worse.
Posted by: Shonane | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 08:59 PM
WhateverDan.What about your hero Rush.If we started to list all the crap and hate that he spews out we would run out of space.I think Franken is hilarious.Its ok when the right attacks.But when the left does it they are bombthrowers.Get a life
Posted by: hecrow | Oct 30, 2005 3:14:28 PM
eatcrow,
Dan's right. In my words: Franken is a DICK.
The difference between Franken and right wing pundits is that a right wing pundit admits he or she is right wing pundit. When it's convenient for Franken to claim he's a left wing pundit he does so. When he says something completely stupid and unsupportable, which, btw, he usually does, he says he's nutin but a lil ole comic, 'get off my back.'
Franken is inadvertantly funny: when he tries to make a logical argument to support his leftist bullshit.
jack
Posted by: jrb | Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 09:02 PM
Put them all in a bag and shake them up and see who falls out first. LOL
Posted by: ! | Monday, October 31, 2005 at 04:57 AM
Wait a minute, while you could cite other examples of misinformation, why did you choose this one? Franken made a statement about a rumor he heard concerning O'Reilly's upbringing, and brought an informed person to verify or refute the veracity of that rumor. When it was exposed that O'R didn't lie, Franken made a joke. He never argued that O'R was lying, and then he moved to verify the truth, which he freely exposed. If only all the pundits, reporters, and liars that we are now subjected to daily used the same standards.
Posted by: RWS | Monday, October 31, 2005 at 10:53 AM
He's an entertainer and most of what he ahd to say to me he said in his first book
Posted by: Dan | Oct 30, 2005 5:24:17 PM
And so is Al, Bill, and all the rest including Peter Jennings.
Now if you want real entertainment just wait until Scooter Libby hits the book and lecture circuit at 80K an hour. That should be hilarious to all "truth sayers."
Posted by: paul | Monday, October 31, 2005 at 11:58 AM
He wasn't even funny when he wrote for Saturday Night Live.
He's a sad, little man who couldn't come up with an original thought to save his life!
Posted by: geek_gurl | Monday, October 31, 2005 at 11:11 PM
It's funny how you seem to have lost Franken's original point, in which he challenges O'Reilly's claim to have grown up dirt poor in a rough neighborhood, when (it turns out) he attended private school and went on vacation every year. In fact, O'Reilly hasn't tried to refute any of that, just seized on Franken's mistake in identifying the neighborhood, which he was good enough to expose on his show.
But hey, why let facts get in the way?
Posted by: jonas | Monday, December 05, 2005 at 12:20 PM