MJ - Bill O'Reilly Lied About His Own War Experiences

[tshile]

Secondly, and this seems quite true, he never went after B Williams, and even said the guy should be given a break.

That's the thing I don't get.

I don't watch OReilly every night, but I catch him from time to time (I enjoy him most of the time even though I don't agree with him a whole lot) and one of the episodes I caught was after the 6th month suspension announcement where he essentially said (if I remember correctly) that he was being punished harder than he should have been. And, I think, he even said what he did was probably more accidental than malicious.

So it seems weird that the narrative is that Oreilly is a hypocrite.

[Larry]

Well, if O'Riely really tore into Williams, then the video will be out there.

And if he didn't, then I assume that people will, instead, point at other Fox personality's differing reactions towards Williams, and O'Reily.

[Burgold]

Well, if O'Riely really tore into Williams, then the video will be out there.

And if he didn't, then I assume that people will, instead, point at other Fox personality's differing reactions towards Williams, and O'Reily.

Yep.  Or looking at it this way, Dan Rather... Fired.  Brian Williams suspended.

 

FOX News (take your pick) host.... anyone... ever???

[tshile]

Well, if O'Riely really tore into Williams, then the video will be out there.

And if he didn't, then I assume that people will, instead, point at other Fox personality's differing reactions towards Williams, and O'Reily.

He's not really attacked williams from what I've seen... i think the original video of his tirade on the media is taken out of context...

but it's bill oreilly and a large portion of people hate him and don't care, they just want a chance to take shots at him.

it's pretty typical these days.

[Lombardi's_kid_brother]

Maybe he was chased by a sheep.

 

I frankly didn't see the big deal in the Williams story. It seems like everyone who has had a experience in a war zone exagerrates it to some degree.

[Passepartout]

O Reilly is really letting it rip into Williams. Williams will not at all be recovering from this at all!

[Hooper]

I'm shocked. Bill O'Reilly incorrect on the facts? 

 

He needs to wash his mouth out with that little loofah thing. Or is it a falafel thing? 

 

Yep, Bill better be careful, or people might take a closer look at the sexual harassment lawsuit he settled for like 20 million. Hilarious stuff. 

[Predicto]

Yep, Bill better be careful, or people might take a closer look at the sexual harassment lawsuit he settled for like 20 million. Hilarious stuff. 

 

 

No they won't.   Anymore than people took a closer look when Rush Limbaugh was caught at the US border with tons of non-prescription Viagra while returning from the Dominican Republic, a country which is notorious for sex tourism.   As far as I can tell, no one investigated further.  In general, the mainstream media doesn't have the stomach for digging up the dirt on anyone from the far right, because they are terrified of being labeled as biased and unfair.  

 

IMO of course.   

 

Putting that aside, I don't care about this story for O'Reilly any more than I cared about it for Williams.  A little blowharding is incredibly common.

[Spaceman Spiff]

You still listening to Mark Levin? Or was just a phase? Not talking ****, generally curious

 

Dunno man, I think you might have me confused.  Only time I've listened to him is being trapped in the car with my parents who are ultra right wingers.  I might have brought up a point or two that he made at one time but I hardly watch any news and certainly don't listen to any political radio.  

[Dan T.]

Well O'REILLY (of whom i am not a fan) is taking this head on and claiming this is all a lot of hooey. First, he never claimed to be in the Faulklands; only that he had witnessed the army mobilizing in Uruguay in response, and that he had to pull a reporter out of the army stampede. Secondly, and this seems quite true, he never went after B Williams, and even said the guy should be given a break.

Transcript excerpt from the YouTube clip in OP.

O'Reilly: "I was in a situation one time, in a war zone in Argentina, in the Falklands, where my photographer got run down and then hit his head and was bleeding from the ear on the concrete."

So, to recap, "in a war zone"... NOT.

"In the Falklands" ... NOT.

He used the Williams issue to call into question the integrity and truthfulness of mainstream media. So it's not difficult at all to smell the sweet, sweet hypocrisy coming out of the blowhard's mouth.

[Burgold]

To me, this story is a little bit more about what FOXNews does and a little bit less about what Bill did. Bill lied about his war experiences in the Falklands.  Okay FOX, whatcha gonna do.

 

If Bill never criticized Williams that's good for Bill, but his station went to town on it.  It's the network and not Bill on the hook for hypocrisy... again.

[DC9]

I'll be straight with ya'll right now - the two celebrities (if we're calling news men and women that these days) that I saw in the most compromising situations in my time in combat zones were Kid Rock and Toby Keith and his band.

 

I never saw journalist one.  Kid Rock went out into the **** with an acoustic guitar during Christmas in 2006, while he was going through a divorce with Pamela and he was just an awesome dude.

 

Toby Keith and his band always went out and did some good stuff, as well.

 

I also just missed our own First Ladies of Football around the time Sean Taylor was shot, they got there about a week after I had returned stateside.

 

You don't hear much out of them, they were just stand up guys and gals.

 

The rest of the guys, their stories are probably as reliable as their opinions on the news.  And I don't put much stock into either.

[DaGoonie55]

I'll be straight with ya'll right now - the two celebrities (if we're calling news men and women that these days) that I saw in the most compromising situations in my time in combat zones were Kid Rock and Toby Keith and his band.

 

I never saw journalist one.  Kid Rock went out into the **** with an acoustic guitar during Christmas in 2006, while he was going through a divorce with Pamela and he was just an awesome dude.

 

Toby Keith and his band always went out and did some good stuff, as well.

 

I also just missed our own First Ladies of Football around the time Sean Taylor was shot, they got there about a week after I had returned stateside.

 

You don't hear much out of them, they were just stand up guys and gals.

 

The rest of the guys, their stories are probably as reliable as their opinions on the news.  And I don't put much stock into either.

 

We had one journalist - Michael Yon.  Wrote about a lot of good stuff over there.  http://www.michaelyon-online.com/

[Dan T.]

I changed the title of the OP, because it doesn't look like O'Reilly jumped on Williams, as I thought at first glance.    However, I do still think the parallels between their "war" stories are remarkable for their similarity in how the truth gets stretched.  

 

That's not good for Williams as lead anchor on a network news broadcast. 

 

And it's not good for O'Reilly either, who touts his background as a newsman and who fronts a television show called "The No Spin Zone."

[DC9]

We had one journalist - Michael Yon.  Wrote about a lot of good stuff over there.  http://www.michaelyon-online.com/

 

Yeah, I heard from some friends that they had some embedded reporters.  Those guys probably got into some stuff or got to see us get into some stuff, no doubt. 

 

But the proverbial big name guys?  I mean, we all know you don't get into the **** every day, or even every week or month.  The big names wouldn't likely be there long enough, or be out far enough, to observe some real stuff.  The embedded guys who spend a few months with a platoon?  Absolutely.

 

Dude looks solid, DaGoonie.

[G.A.C.O.L.B.]

Dunno man, I think you might have me confused. Only time I've listened to him is being trapped in the car with my parents who are ultra right wingers. I might have brought up a point or two that he made at one time but I hardly watch any news and certainly don't listen to any political radio.

I could've sworn it was you. Now I'm tripping myself out trying to remember. How do you search archived threads? This was at least 5 years ago

[Zguy28]

I wonder how Joseph Galloway feels about this stuff. There is a guy who really was in the thick of it.

[balki1867]

I wonder how Joseph Galloway feels about this stuff. There is a guy who really was in the thick of it.

 

[Dan T.]

To me, this story is a little bit more about what FOXNews does and a little bit less about what Bill did. Bill lied about his war experiences in the Falklands.  Okay FOX, whatcha gonna do.

 

If Bill never criticized Williams that's good for Bill, but his station went to town on it.  It's the network and not Bill on the hook for hypocrisy... again.

Maybe if they tweaked their logo

[Predicto]

Yeah, I heard from some friends that they had some embedded reporters.  Those guys probably got into some stuff or got to see us get into some stuff, no doubt. 

 

But the proverbial big name guys?  I mean, we all know you don't get into the **** every day, or even every week or month.  The big names wouldn't likely be there long enough, or be out far enough, to observe some real stuff.  The embedded guys who spend a few months with a platoon?  Absolutely.

 

 

 

Except, of course, ABC anchorman Bob Woodruff, who got half his brain blown out by a roadside bomb.  I can imagine that the networks are not going to let their big names get that close to the action anymore.

[Bliz]

http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2015/02/media-matters-oreilly-lied-about-florida-suicide-203052.html?hp=l3_3

 

Fox News host Bill O’Reilly has repeatedly lied about being present at the suicide of Lee Harvey Oswald associate George S. de Mohrenschildt, the left-leaning watchdog group Media Matters alleged in a new report on Tuesday.

In his book “Killing Kennedy” and in several other appearances, O’Reilly has said that as a reporter for the Dallas-based station WFAA-TV he was on the porch of de Mohrenschildt’s daughter’s house in Palm Beach, Florida, when he heard de Mohrenschildt shoot himself with a shotgun in March of 1977.

“At the time, de Mohrenschildt had been called to testify before a congressional committee looking into the events of November 1963. As the reporter knocked on the door of de Mohrenschildt’s daughter’s home, he heard the shotgun blast that marked the suicide of the Russian, assuring that his relationship with Lee Harvey Oswald would never be fully understood. By the way, that reporter’s name is Bill O’Reilly,” O’Reilly wrote in the 2012 book.

Two former colleagues of O’Reilly’s at WFAA-TV, Byron Harris and Tracy Rowlett, told Media Matters O’Reilly was in Dallas at the time of de Mohrenschildt’s suicide.

Media Matters also points to the autobiography of Gaeton Fonzi, an investigator on the House Select Committee on Assassinations, who wrote that O’Reilly called him to ask about the assassination.

“About 6:30 that evening I received a call from Bill O’Reilly, a friend who was then a television reporter in Dallas. ‘Funny thing happened,’ he said. ‘We just aired a story that come over the wire about a Dutch journalist saying the Assassinations Committee has finally located de Mohrenschildt in South Florida. Now de Mohrenschildt’s attorney, a guy named Pat Russell, he calls and says de Mohrenschildt committed suicide this afternoon. Is that true?” Fonzi wrote.

Taped telephone conversations between Fonzi and O’Reilly also reportedly have O’Reilly telling Fonzi that he “has been trying to run down the story by telephone from Texas” but that he’d be heading to Florida to investigate it further.

 

[skinsmarydu]

Maybe if they tweaked their logo

That's what it WOULD look like in Canada...if Canada hadn't banned the network for "not being news".

[Dan T.]

Now  evidence has emerged that O'Reilly lied about being present at the suicide of a friend of Kennedy assassin Lee Harvey Oswald in Florida on March 29,1977.  Earlier that day George de Mohrenschildt received a note from an investigator with the House Select Committee on Assassinations asking to speak to him.

 

In his book "Killing Kennedy," O'Reilly claims that, as a reporter for Dallas TV station WFAA in Dallas, he tracked George de Mohrenschildt to his daughter's house in Florida, and that as he knocked on the door of the residence, he heard the sound of a shotgun blast.  He has repeated the story over the years, including on air on "Fox and Friends."

 

Here's the quote from his book, "Killing Kennedy":

 

At the time, de Mohrenschildt had been called to testify before a congressional committee looking into the events of November 1963. As the reporter knocked on the door of de Mohrenschildt’s daughter’s home, he heard the shotgun blast that marked the suicide of the Russian, assuring that his relationship with Lee Harvey Oswald would never be fully understood. By the way, that reporter’s name is Bill O’Reilly.

 

 

This link includes a clip of O'Reilly's retelling the story on Fox and Friends:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/25/oreilly-suicide-mohrenschildt_n_6749182.html

 

 

Now a bunch of evidence has emerged indicating that O'Reilly was actually in Dallas that day and not in Florida.

http://www.syracuse.com/us-news/index.ssf/2015/02/bill_oreilly_new_allegations_suicide_witness_jfk_assassination.html

 

[Chachie]

I never even considered O'Reilly  a reliable source of information, so I don't think it damages his credibility like Williams, as O'Reilly had no credibility to lose as a 'newsman'.

 

That said, I hope he gets a through beating over this, because he's one of the biggest douches in the media.

 

 

 

This. I always assumed every word out of his mouth was a lie... so what's new here? If people are "hurt" by this, they should have realized long ago that O'Reilly is no more reliable than the Onion and a lot less funny.

 

He'll never be punished because this world is unfair.

[Burgold]

Again, for me, this speaks much more about FOX News and its "integrity" than Bill's.  Their newsroom made a decision in how to handle the Brian Williams' issue and the network followed suit. They had editorial guidance on this.

 

To completely dismiss the apple to apple issue puts them in a light which because of the carefully cultivated victimhood their listeners will completely ignore and they will get away with. Though it was nice to see Vets take Bill to task at least.