In Salon Gabriel Winant wrote about O'Reilly:
there's no other person who bears as much responsibility for the characterization of Tiller as a savage on the loose, killing babies willy-nilly thanks to the collusion of would-be sophisticated cultural elites, a bought-and-paid-for governor and scofflaw secular journalists. Tiller's name first appeared on "The Factor" on Feb. 25, 2005. Since then, O'Reilly and his guest hosts have brought up the doctor on 28 more episodes, including as recently as April 27 of this year. Almost invariably, Tiller is described as "Tiller the Baby Killer."
Tiller, O'Reilly likes to say, "destroys fetuses for just about any reason right up until the birth date for $5,000." He's guilty of "Nazi stuff," said O'Reilly on June 8, 2005; a moral equivalent to NAMBLA and al-Qaida, he suggested on March 15, 2006. "This is the kind of stuff happened in Mao's China, Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Soviet Union," said O'Reilly on Nov. 9, 2006.
In the first video, O'Reilly is ranting about people saying bad things about him, things which he claims are not true, and therefore are "libel"--even though he admits they're not against the law, he claims they violate his rights. But in the second video, we see snippets of his ongoing demonization of George Tiller, which involved numerous vicious lies, portraying the abortions Tiller performed as being done for virtually no reason at all--except the money. And, indeed, Winant goes on to show how O'Reilly lied about others as well, including the judge who presided over the trumped up trial in which Tiller was cleared of all charges brought against, as well as Governor Kathleen Sebelius. What's more, Winant correctly points out, these lies are all patterned after ancient conservative narratives which are, quite frankly, delusional:
Tiller's excuses for performing late-term abortions, O'Reilly suggested, were frou-frou, New Age, false ailments: The woman might have a headache or anxiety, or have been dumped by her boyfriend. She might be "depressed," scoffed O'Reilly, which he dismissed as "feeling a bit blue and carr[ying] a certified check." There was, he proposed on Jan. 5, 2007, a kind of elite conspiracy of silence on Tiller. "Yes, OK, but we know about the press. But it becomes a much more intense problem when you have a judge, confronted with evidence of criminal wrongdoing, who throws it out on some technicality because he wants to be liked at the country club. Then it's intense."
Tiller, said O'Reilly on Jan. 6 of this year, was a major supporter of then-Gov. Kathleen Sebelius. "I think it's unfairly characterized as just a grip and grin relationship. He was a pretty big supporter of hers." She had cashed her campaign check from Tiller, "doesn't seem to be real upset about this guy operating a death mill, which is exactly what it is in her state, does she?" he asked on July 14 of last year. "Maybe she'll -- maybe she'll pardon him," he scoffed two months ago.
This is where it gets most troubling. O'Reilly's language describing Tiller, and accusing the state and its elites of complicity in his actions, could become extremely vivid. On June 12, 2007, he said, "Yes, I think we all know what this is. And if the state of Kansas doesn't stop this man, then anybody who prevents that from happening has blood on their hands as the governor does right now, Governor Sebelius."
Three days later, he added, "No question Dr. Tiller has blood on his hands. But now so does Governor Sebelius. She is not fit to serve. Nor is any Kansas politician who supports Tiller's business of destruction. I wouldn't want to be these people if there is a Judgment Day. I just -- you know ... Kansas is a great state, but this is a disgrace upon everyone who lives in Kansas. Is it not?"
This characterization of Tiller fits exactly into ancient conservative, paranoid stories: a decadent, permissive and callous elite tolerates moral monstrosities that every common-sense citizen just knows to be awful. Conspiring against our folk wisdom, O'Reilly says, the sophisticates have shielded Tiller from the appropriate, legal consequences for his deeds. It's left to "judgment day" to give him what's coming.
In short, the entire framework of everything O'Reilly has had to say about Tiller, and anyone remotely related to him, has been delusional fantasy. It's not just a matter of isolated disputed remarks. It's an entire political discourse unhinged from reality. But because O'Reilly is the author of it, it is, of course, perfectly rational, perfectly normal, the very embodiment of common sense.
This is the same delusional mentality that lead O'Reilly to force Fox into it's farcical lawsuit against Al Franken. Indeed, it's the same delusional pre-modern mentality that hasn't been able to handle science, democracy, free speech, the abolition of slavery, the emancipation of women, or any other fundamental anti-authoritarian developments of the past 500 years. The murder of George Tiller marks this as an especially dark moment, but the up-is-down delusional worldview of Bill O'Reilly is anything but an aberration where rightwing politics is concerned.
Demonization of "others" has always been at the heart of this worldview, and as liberalism emerged as a coherent body of thought, feed by the triple revolution of the Renaissance, the Reformation, and the Enlightenment, and defending the basic dignity of those whom reactionaries constantly demonize, liberals came to become the primary targets of rightwing demonization.
After all, it was liberals, with roots in Renaissance Italy, who first pushed the notion that people could govern themselves with a republican form of government, rather than top-down empires, monarchies and feudal hierarchies, all supposedly blessed by God, so that questioning anything was tantomount to heresy. This only grew worse as the Reformation raised the dignity of the individual conscience to challenge the hierarchical power of the Church, and the Enligtenment gave similar dignity to individual experience and reason. Each of these movements--along with the long, slow evolution of the empirically-grounded common law jury system--has helped push back the power of a self-annointed, delusional aristocracy, with its claims of divine sanction.
Nothing angers them more than having their absolute power challenged. It's particularly frustrating to them, having to use liberal and egalitarian language to fight their battles, which is why O'Reilly is often talking in complete self-contradiction, telling people to "shut up" as he explains the "spirit" of free speeh.
Make no mistake about it, this is what we are seeing right now, an ewven more fundamental struggle than that over abortion--a struggle over the right to define reality itself: Will it be, as it once was in the dark, dim past, a matter to be settled by blind declaration of whoever has the power to silence everyone else? Or will reality be fiercely independent of the tyrant's will--partly determined by each and every one of us, and partly determined by our willingness to live with realities--both human and not--that have their own separate integrity worthy of our respect? |
