Thursday, April 27, 2006
O'Reilly Fails His Own Civics Test
Bill O'Reilly thinks high school students should be given a basic civics test. If they fail that test, he thinks they should be sent to Canada.
On Tuesday's edition of his radio show, O'Reilly said that "most high school kids in this country couldn't pass a civics test. They don't know what's going on. They don't know what the House of Representatives is; they don't know what the judicial branch is. They don't know anything."
"So, I have a bill that would throw all those kids out. All right? Let's do that. Let's get rid of all these dopey kids. OK? Y'all with me on that one? Can't pass the civics test, Seymour? Say hello to Canada."
Unfortunately for O'Reilly, this was the same show in which he showed his own ignorance of American Civics. O'Reilly, in a tirade about the U.S. Department of Energy, incorrectly identified the Secretary of Energy.
"Spencer Abraham doesn't understand it. He is -- in case you didn't know, because nobody does -- he is the secretary of energy. Spencer Abraham. And he's the invisible man. Only his hat shows up for work. He sits at a desk and all you see is the pen. You can't see him, he's invisible. But he did make a statement."
O'Reilly then played an audio clip of Samuel Bodman, the actual Secretary of Energy. Even after playing the clip, O'Reilly continued to incorrectly identify the Secretary of Energy as Spencer Abraham.
"But Spencer Abraham is not a leader. He doesn't know what he's doing. You know, he has no agenda here. Yeah, OK, refinery capacity is tight. What have you done about it for five years, Bush administration? Nothing."
Sometime later in the show, after realizing his error, O'Reilly attempted to correct himself, but also suggested (hopefully in jest) that the two are actually the same man.
"I am a pinhead. There's no question about it today. Spencer Abraham is the former secretary of energy. Samuel Bodman is the current. Now, I made the mistake because they're the same person. They are. People don't know that, but they are. Have you ever seen them together?"
"Spencer Abraham and Samuel Bodman -- really, the same guy. It's just they changed -- they had a name change when -- because they -- now, nobody on earth knows that the energy secretary is Samuel Bodman. Why? Because Samuel Bodman is the invisible man. That was the riff I was doing. Who is he? Nobody knows, and he doesn't know he's energy secretary and that's the tragedy."
This is not O'Reilly's first display of ignorance this week. On Monday's radio show, he blasted the New York Times for it's reporting on Mary McCarthy. McCarthy is the CIA agent fired for leaking information to the press. O'Reilly suggested that the Times was biased toward McCarthy because she leaked information to them.
"You may have heard this CIA officer, Mary McCarthy, is fired because she was leaking stuff to the press about the CIA. And, of course, on Sunday, The New York Times had a glowing article about Mary McCarthy, what a great patriot she is, because she was leaking stuff to them."
In fact, McCarthy gave information to the Washington Post.
Also on Monday, O'Reilly told radio listeners that the Federal and State Governments make more money as gas prices rise, suggesting that federal and state taxes are a percentage of retail prices.
"Now there is a legitimate argument about the government, both state and federal, taxing gasoline, which they do all over the place. So, of course, they're making more money, the government's making more money now that the uh, gasoline prices are higher, because their tax goes up. Percentage of money they get goes up. So maybe that's factoring into it. I don't know."
In fact, the tax levied by the federal government remains constant. Currently, the federal tax on gasoline is 18.4 cents per gallon, and the federal tax on diesel is 24.4 cents per gallon.
According to the American Petroleum Institute (API), 38 states have no percentage-based gasoline tax, opting instead for set taxes automatically factored into the retail price of gas. So, for the federal government and the majority of states, gasoline-tax revenue will remain constant, regardless of the retail price of gasoline.
The week did not begin well for O'Reilly. Monday brought him another "Worst Person in the World" award from MSNBC's Keith Olbermann. Olbermann awarded O'Reilly the dubious honor for O'Reilly's declaration that he only trusts war information from military analysts that work exclusively for Fox News. Olbermann reminded viewers of some of the gross mistakes made by those analysts.
"Like the guy, [retired] Colonel [David] Hunt, who mocked the idea that there weren't enough armored vehicles in Iraq, or [retired Lieutenant Colonel] Oliver North, who said Saddam Hussein would be killed within three days of any invasion by his own people? Or [retired Lieutenant] Colonel [Robert] Maginnis, who said that the reality is we're not going to see thousands of American deaths? Those guys? Those geniuses?"
Tuesday's show brought more outright Hypocrisy from O'Reilly. O'Reilly was complaining about the way former Fox News Commentator-turned White House Press Secretary Tony Snow can have his words used against him. After announcing that "the smear stops here" on his Monday radio show, O'Reilly called Democrats and the rest of the media "Nazis."
"So, you got these smear merchants on the Internet and they operate through some newspaper people and a couple of television people who just parrot what they give them. They're despicable human beings, these smear merchants on the -- on the net. And the press is even worse. It just spits out their propaganda. I mean, these are Nazis. These are Joseph Goebbels people."
O'Reilly doesn't like to have his own words repeated to him. Perhaps this will land me in his new "Hall of Shame," also announced on Monday's radio show. I'm sure he's already reserved a special place for the folks at Media Matters for America, the same folks to whom I must credit most of the information contained in this post.
On Tuesday's edition of his radio show, O'Reilly said that "most high school kids in this country couldn't pass a civics test. They don't know what's going on. They don't know what the House of Representatives is; they don't know what the judicial branch is. They don't know anything."
"So, I have a bill that would throw all those kids out. All right? Let's do that. Let's get rid of all these dopey kids. OK? Y'all with me on that one? Can't pass the civics test, Seymour? Say hello to Canada."
Unfortunately for O'Reilly, this was the same show in which he showed his own ignorance of American Civics. O'Reilly, in a tirade about the U.S. Department of Energy, incorrectly identified the Secretary of Energy.
"Spencer Abraham doesn't understand it. He is -- in case you didn't know, because nobody does -- he is the secretary of energy. Spencer Abraham. And he's the invisible man. Only his hat shows up for work. He sits at a desk and all you see is the pen. You can't see him, he's invisible. But he did make a statement."
O'Reilly then played an audio clip of Samuel Bodman, the actual Secretary of Energy. Even after playing the clip, O'Reilly continued to incorrectly identify the Secretary of Energy as Spencer Abraham.
"But Spencer Abraham is not a leader. He doesn't know what he's doing. You know, he has no agenda here. Yeah, OK, refinery capacity is tight. What have you done about it for five years, Bush administration? Nothing."
Sometime later in the show, after realizing his error, O'Reilly attempted to correct himself, but also suggested (hopefully in jest) that the two are actually the same man.
"I am a pinhead. There's no question about it today. Spencer Abraham is the former secretary of energy. Samuel Bodman is the current. Now, I made the mistake because they're the same person. They are. People don't know that, but they are. Have you ever seen them together?"
"Spencer Abraham and Samuel Bodman -- really, the same guy. It's just they changed -- they had a name change when -- because they -- now, nobody on earth knows that the energy secretary is Samuel Bodman. Why? Because Samuel Bodman is the invisible man. That was the riff I was doing. Who is he? Nobody knows, and he doesn't know he's energy secretary and that's the tragedy."
This is not O'Reilly's first display of ignorance this week. On Monday's radio show, he blasted the New York Times for it's reporting on Mary McCarthy. McCarthy is the CIA agent fired for leaking information to the press. O'Reilly suggested that the Times was biased toward McCarthy because she leaked information to them.
"You may have heard this CIA officer, Mary McCarthy, is fired because she was leaking stuff to the press about the CIA. And, of course, on Sunday, The New York Times had a glowing article about Mary McCarthy, what a great patriot she is, because she was leaking stuff to them."
In fact, McCarthy gave information to the Washington Post.
Also on Monday, O'Reilly told radio listeners that the Federal and State Governments make more money as gas prices rise, suggesting that federal and state taxes are a percentage of retail prices.
"Now there is a legitimate argument about the government, both state and federal, taxing gasoline, which they do all over the place. So, of course, they're making more money, the government's making more money now that the uh, gasoline prices are higher, because their tax goes up. Percentage of money they get goes up. So maybe that's factoring into it. I don't know."
In fact, the tax levied by the federal government remains constant. Currently, the federal tax on gasoline is 18.4 cents per gallon, and the federal tax on diesel is 24.4 cents per gallon.
According to the American Petroleum Institute (API), 38 states have no percentage-based gasoline tax, opting instead for set taxes automatically factored into the retail price of gas. So, for the federal government and the majority of states, gasoline-tax revenue will remain constant, regardless of the retail price of gasoline.
The week did not begin well for O'Reilly. Monday brought him another "Worst Person in the World" award from MSNBC's Keith Olbermann. Olbermann awarded O'Reilly the dubious honor for O'Reilly's declaration that he only trusts war information from military analysts that work exclusively for Fox News. Olbermann reminded viewers of some of the gross mistakes made by those analysts.
"Like the guy, [retired] Colonel [David] Hunt, who mocked the idea that there weren't enough armored vehicles in Iraq, or [retired Lieutenant Colonel] Oliver North, who said Saddam Hussein would be killed within three days of any invasion by his own people? Or [retired Lieutenant] Colonel [Robert] Maginnis, who said that the reality is we're not going to see thousands of American deaths? Those guys? Those geniuses?"
Tuesday's show brought more outright Hypocrisy from O'Reilly. O'Reilly was complaining about the way former Fox News Commentator-turned White House Press Secretary Tony Snow can have his words used against him. After announcing that "the smear stops here" on his Monday radio show, O'Reilly called Democrats and the rest of the media "Nazis."
"So, you got these smear merchants on the Internet and they operate through some newspaper people and a couple of television people who just parrot what they give them. They're despicable human beings, these smear merchants on the -- on the net. And the press is even worse. It just spits out their propaganda. I mean, these are Nazis. These are Joseph Goebbels people."
O'Reilly doesn't like to have his own words repeated to him. Perhaps this will land me in his new "Hall of Shame," also announced on Monday's radio show. I'm sure he's already reserved a special place for the folks at Media Matters for America, the same folks to whom I must credit most of the information contained in this post.
Comments:
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First of all, Jason, I don't see any links.
Secondly, I don't think your map analysis proves anything. In fact, it defies logic. Houston, Texas, home to many refieries, pays about 10 cents more per gallon than Lampasas, Texas, (my hometown) that sits in the middle of the state. Most people would assume that the closer to a refinery one is, the cheaper one's gas prices would be (considering the cost of delivery). As anyone who drives across Texas knows, that isn't true.
Gas prices are based on a number of factors. They have absolutely nothing to do with who voted for whom.
More troubling than your faulty map analysis is your failure to understand my post. I am not attributing anything to the President. I am saying that Bill O'Reilly, much like you, doesn't understand the issue and advances false information to prove his lack of understanding. Gas taxes levied by the federal government and mosts of the states are at a set number. They do not change as prices change.
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Secondly, I don't think your map analysis proves anything. In fact, it defies logic. Houston, Texas, home to many refieries, pays about 10 cents more per gallon than Lampasas, Texas, (my hometown) that sits in the middle of the state. Most people would assume that the closer to a refinery one is, the cheaper one's gas prices would be (considering the cost of delivery). As anyone who drives across Texas knows, that isn't true.
Gas prices are based on a number of factors. They have absolutely nothing to do with who voted for whom.
More troubling than your faulty map analysis is your failure to understand my post. I am not attributing anything to the President. I am saying that Bill O'Reilly, much like you, doesn't understand the issue and advances false information to prove his lack of understanding. Gas taxes levied by the federal government and mosts of the states are at a set number. They do not change as prices change.
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