THE PLANK FEBRUARY 20, 2008
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The bombastic right-wing talk-show host was recently asked about Michelle Obama's comments that "for the first time in my adult lifetime, I'm really proud of my country." O'Reilly made the shudder-inducing reply, "I don't want to go on a lynching party against Michelle Obama unless there's evidence, hard facts, that say this is how the woman really feels."
Yes, the implication of that statement is that O'Reilly does want to lynch Michelle Obama if she isn't patriotic. But come on -- he doesn't really think that, and of course he didn't mean it. (For that matter, I'm pretty sure Michelle Obama didn't mean that she was never proud of the United States before, either, even though that is the implication of her statement.) So, let's call the lyn -- er, outrage mob off of O'Reilly this time.
--Jonathan Chait
45 comments
at least he does not want to falafel her...
- mpintar2
February 20, 2008 at 4:11pm
Something tells me thats not the last accidental slip of a cringe-inducing euphamism that we'll hear out of Bill and the kids this year. Sounding fair and balanced already, and its only February.
- mjhniner
February 20, 2008 at 4:18pm
So what exactly did she mean by that asinine, puzzling, dispiriting remark?
Isn't it a bit odd to hear this kind of verbal RPG from the wife of the man who promises to end the bitter divide between the boomers on issues like... pride in America? Why is she resurrecting a meme from the pissing matches of the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s?
- teplukhin2you
February 20, 2008 at 4:22pm
It will be nice to have a real discussion about american exceptionalism.
Isn't it a bit disgusting to throw around the word 'lynch' when talking about an African American? Didn't some golf announcer get in trouble with this wrt Tiger Woods?
O'Reilly's constantly eliminationist rhetoric is awful, especially since it's all cynical.
- mmathog
February 20, 2008 at 4:22pm
I'm wary of defending this turd, but I saw that last night and the comment reads harsher than it sounded -- he said he was ready to accept Michelle Obama's explanation (probably not really, but...) but hammered her on not making a statement and going into hiding. I'm also getting a bit wary of the hyper-sensitivity to the term "lynch" -- I'm sorry, lynch-mob is a cliche and I think a lot of good people might not have the "mental brakes" to avoid using it in connection to an African-American.
- Lymon1
February 20, 2008 at 4:22pm
Stay classy Bill - but his sentiments at least resembled a fair response. I'm shocked.
- Wandreycer1
February 20, 2008 at 4:25pm
Tep: She meant she was REALLY proud, not just proud. Duh.
- bcbaird
February 20, 2008 at 4:32pm
I love the ironic parallels in this post, Jon. You nailed it.
- rozenson
February 20, 2008 at 4:36pm
I doubt he meant it...
But aren't most outrageous/offensive comments accidental? Merits some outrage...
- virginiacentrist
February 20, 2008 at 4:36pm
A bad choice of bad words on O'Reilly's part, but just the kind of thing that will sink McBush.
The miscreants engaged in that digmix called Talk Radio can't help themselves, there will be daily gaffes that will drive the moderates and independents away. You've seen it start already in Wisconsin, where McBush did poorly with independents.
O'Reilly, what a yowf.
- fougasseu
February 20, 2008 at 4:40pm
Hmmm, let's see, the whitewater/lewinskly charade, Bush v. Gore, Swiftboat Veterans for Truth, Abu Ghraib, the Patriot Act.....what's not to be proud of? Why can't Michelle Obama say how she feels? I don't agree with her wording, and i'm sure she wishes she was more nuanced, but we need to stop acting like its unpatriotic or somehow wrong to express disappointment with our country. It doesn't mean we don't love it.
- japsheeh
February 20, 2008 at 4:40pm
I am impressed with O'Reilly. At least he recognizes the proclivity of the Right WIng to make up stories out of whole cloth
- tembrach
February 20, 2008 at 4:43pm
"I'm sorry, lynch-mob is a cliche and I think a lot of good people might not have the "mental brakes" to avoid using it in connection to an African-American."
That doesn't include Bill O'Reilly, he's not 28 years old, and he's a professional (and very talented) communicator, he knows what he's doing.
It's not the end of the world, and I don't think O'Reilly should be, in any way, shape, or form, punished for it. But I'm free to criticize it as insensitive and assholish.
- mmathog
February 20, 2008 at 4:46pm
Good for her for not being bullied by patriotically correct jackals in her response this afternoon. This whole thing is so stupid even O'Reilly is not lame enough to jump.
- Wandreycer1
February 20, 2008 at 5:06pm
In his own Archie Bunkeresque way, this is actually a rather thoughtful, fair-minded statement from O'Reilly.
- CharlesFosterKane
February 20, 2008 at 5:06pm
Sounds like a bad choice of words to comment on a bad choice of words, with little chance that each speaker really meant the worst possible interpretation that could be given to each word choice. At the very least, what applies to the goose should apply to the gander.
- gbittner
February 20, 2008 at 5:07pm
Sounds like a bad choice of words to comment on a bad choice of words, with little chance that each speaker really meant the worst possible interpretation that could be given to each word choice. At the very least, what applies to the goose should apply to the gander.
- gbittner
February 20, 2008 at 5:07pm
Great post, Jonathan.
Exactly right.
Nothing to see here from either incident. I'm sure Michelle loved America, at some point, maybe during the Superbowl, and O'Reilly's just the mad uncle in the corner who gets too wasted at Xmas looney.
People need to take a breather from the horse race saturation and walk the dog.
- The Ignorant Populist
February 20, 2008 at 5:16pm
You guys are being waaaaay to kind to O'Reilly. This is a man who literally makes a fortune out of twisting the statements of liberals in order to accuse them of all manner of horrible things. That he was able to restrain himself in this instance is admirable, if confusing. I'm guessing he thinks that MO doesn't make a large enough target (which is probably correct). But make no mistake, if the shoe were on the other foot there is no way he would be letting Chait (or Obama, or any other liberal) off the hook.
Also, mmathog: Care to provide an example of hopeful "eliminationist rhetoric?"
- marcellusw101
February 20, 2008 at 5:21pm
On Bill's statement: Haven't there been a couple of high-profile recent cases of use of the word lynch? Didn't W. himself address the issue? I'm not saying that outrage over every use of the word is justified -- certainly not -- but the mere fact that this has been a recent thing suggests that just maybe Bill used the word deliberately and not by accident.
On Michelle's statement: One thing to keep clear is that she is not saying that she is, for the first time, proud to be an American, as though she was disgusted with her national identity previously. Rather she said, for the first time in her adult life, she feels really proud of her country. I think that what she means is that she is witnessing something *extraordinary* -- unexpected and profoundly heartening -- and that, perhaps, she suspected her fellow citizens and her country's political institutions didn't have it in them to support a black man for president with the sort of mesesage that Obama offers. (If she did think that, she was hardly alone.) This against a backdrop of many big disappointments for liberlas during this time, when the political leadership and mood of the country seemed to shift to the right and away from what she probably perceives to be true American values. (My suspicion is that Michelle is more liberal than her husband and might not have always been so audacious as to entertain big hopes. I'm picturing a dynamic similar to that between Tony Blair and his wife as depicted in the movie The Queen. This is reaching, I know, but I get that sense from what she says and how she says it.)
So her mistake was twofold -- (1) to use the word "pride" not as a slogan but to describe the feeling of being really impressed, and (2) to not be really impressed easily, i.e., to have high standards for her country. Some love-it-or-leave-it types may get goose bumps whenever John Ashcroft breaks into song, but she's not that sort of person, thank goodness.
- jhildner
February 20, 2008 at 5:34pm
jhildner- Very well said.
- davidsmith192
February 20, 2008 at 5:59pm
I can't believe I'm about to stick up for Bill O'Reilly, but he was clearly trying to be (reasonably) responsible before he 'mis-spoke' -- mediamatters.org/.../200802200001
But additionally, what a great opportunity for Obama to respond positively when asked about it -- along the lines of:
I understand why people are upset, but it's no big deal to me at this point. Look, I've been talking about why we want to move away from the destructive politics of the past and I think that as a responsible fair person that I can certainly understand that Bill chose his words poorly on this occasion, in the same way Michelle did earlier in the week, and there was no underlying mal-intent.
- aref_j
February 20, 2008 at 6:06pm
huh marcellus? I don't understand.
- mmathog
February 20, 2008 at 6:09pm
"Hey, go easy on Joe Lieberman. It's not like we should be sending him to Auchwitz over this. All he did was run as an Independent."
"Japanese whaling boats should be stopped, but before we nuke the Japanese we should remember that they're research vessels."
"I believe Larry Craig when he says he's not gay, so we should hold off on beating him senseless."
- stgla
February 20, 2008 at 6:09pm
My knee-jerk reaction: not offended. Because he cautioned against lynching. If he comes out in favor, I revise.
One thought: he might have been outrage-baiting: "Pimping Chelsea?Ha! How about lynching Michelle" so then he can defend himself with equal or greater outrage. For attention and all. But again, still not caring.
- psantillana
February 20, 2008 at 6:13pm
People who attack O'Reilly are doing him a favor. He wants the "radical left" (ie anyone left of Joe Lieberman) to attack him, so he can present himself as the sensible, centrist, populist representative of "the folks." Hating him is like hating the Emperor in Star Wars: it makes him stronger.
- propositionjoe
February 20, 2008 at 6:22pm
I can't believe anyone would make excuses for O'Reilly because it was a completely unacceptable remark, but knowing O'Reilly's devious little rat brain, I've got a pretty good idea of exactly what he is trying to accomplish when he uses this kind of language, and it wasn't any accident. O'Reilly is trying to stir up racial animus, create a backlash and a media firestorm to motivate the racist vote in Ohio and Texas. The man is filth, always has been, always will be.
- AaronBBrown
February 20, 2008 at 6:32pm
Mr. Brown. Seems there is a racist behind every tree. Umm. O'Reilly isn't filth. He's often clumsy. Especially when he thinks he's really zeroed in. Which can be kind of comedic. But filth?
- boxofrox
February 20, 2008 at 7:37pm
Despite his extremely poor choice of verb, O'Reilly is actually making a pretty temperate and reasonable point. Credit to him for not jumping on the GOP talking point. Minus credit for using the word "lynch." Geez.
- glacialspeed
February 20, 2008 at 7:49pm
hildner - not very convincing. If our resident Lawyer Silvertongue can't sway the jury, it must be a very weak case.
Look, I used to live abroad, spent a lot of time in a couple of major, once-great, world-leading nations whose citizens were and still largely are dispirited and declinist: Russia and France. Despite all the kvetching and bitching and heated arguments about this or that Traitor To The Nation, _never_ did I hear anyone say that he or she was ashamed of his country. It just isn't done.
Or even imaginable; it's like disowning your mother. Maybe she drives you nuts, maybe she's not your cup of tea, but you don't go around telling people you're ashamed of her. As much as they may have hated America for bombing Milosevic, the Russians I know simply could not understand how an _American_ would burn his flag or piss on his nation.
Frankly, I can't either. It's a very weird American thing, also a recent American thing, that seems to be joined to that strange American inability to distinguish where America does have crucial influence (cf Russia's response to the Reagan escalation of the arms race) and where it does not (cf Russia's post-USSR descent into African-style kleptocracy and banditry).
- teplukhin2you
February 20, 2008 at 8:03pm
stgla, ha. good ones
- blackton
February 20, 2008 at 8:34pm
Yep, Tep,
but I bet the Russians also wonder why we don't let the current president just pick the next one for us.
This whole patriotic-to-a-fault thing is somewhat recent. It wasn't until the 20th century that we had a pledge of allegiance. Americans have always been critical of the country. There have been protests for every war we've been involved in. We've had people move west just to get away from the government, and I'm already hearing rumblings from Republicans about moving out of the country if a Democrat wins.
- anonevent
February 20, 2008 at 9:40pm
Tep, thanks for the compliment, but I'll throw back the criticism -- not very convincing!
First, she didn't say she was ever ashamed of her country or ashamed to be an American or anything similar. There's a lot of daylight between "really proud" and "ashamed," especially if you're not the sort who routinely luxuriates in artificial patriotic pieties.
Second, it's pretty clear that she wasn't disparaging American-ness but rather, *at most*, what America did or didn't do during her adult lifetime. Is that so awful? If the charge is that she wasn't personally thrilled by Reagan's cold war policy, well, golly, I guess she really does hate America. There's a big difference between how you feel about being an American and how you feel about what America does. You may be very disappointed with your country, but that doesn't mean you're in any way unpatriotic, unless patriotism means uncritical praise.
Third, she wasn't even really disparaging anything. She was saying, like I said before, that she's really impressed with what she's seeing now, and that the feeling is new. Maybe you thought the Clinton administration, for example, was so-so. (That will be the view of history, I think.) So-so doesn't equal "really proud."
The reason we have harsh dissent in this country (which this was hardly an example of) is the same reason we have a lot of religiosity. Because we're uniquely committed to the freedom to express it. We're not bound by ethnicity, as are the Franch or the Russians. Your anaology to a mother is apt. It suggests a genetic link Americans don't have. We're bound not by genetics but by ideas, ideas which emphasize freedom -- something which may seem to run counter to the very notion of nationalist sentiment. But so strong has our commitment been to those ideas that we've been able to say, from many, one. True patriotism for an American consists not in honoring what America does, or honoring who America elects to office, or honoring your mother, but rather in honoring American ideas, and that means expressing dissent or disappointment can be the most patriotic thing you can do.
- jhildner
February 21, 2008 at 3:10am
Au contraire, counselor. The French Republic and its conception of citizenship are explicitly hostile to ethnic or racial identities, and they're of course dedicated to a set of intellectual precepts that are if anything more idealistic than ours.
You make my point for me. How can you be steeped in this nation's history, go through the premier law school in the nation, and not find something to be really proud of? Can you even imagine an enarque, the French equivalent of an HLS grad, crowing that he was proud of France for the first time in his life because... his favored candidate won the first round of a presidential election?
Also, she wasn't talking about dissent, as you put it. She went out of her way to state very clearly that she wasn't proud of her nation prior to her husband's presidential run. For someone engaged in politics, esp a graduate of Harvard Law School, it's not likely that "not proud" = apathetic; the logical conclusion is that she felt the opposite of pride. AKA shame. Or a sense of humiliation and degradation.
Looking back at the spectacular achievements of the last quarter century, I find that sentiment extremely odd. Does this woman even remember the nightmare that was the Cold War, or the horrors unleashed on a third of the world's population by our adversaries in that long war? Does she even comprehend what an extraordinary achievement it was to bring the Soviet Empire to an end without plunging us into WWIII?
I'm not opposed to Obama and will almost certainly vote for him, but really, someone needs to muzzle his idiot wife, get her out of view.
- teplukhin2you
February 21, 2008 at 3:55am
fwiw, Bill O'Reilly is a complete jackass. It pains me that our side is once again (remember Madame Tereza?) placing big fat easy targets squarely in this asshole's slime-gun sights.
- teplukhin2you
February 21, 2008 at 4:22am
"Look, I used to live abroad, spent a lot of time in a couple of major, once-great, world-leading nations whose citizens were and still largely are dispirited and declinist: Russia and France. Despite all the kvetching and bitching and heated arguments about this or that Traitor To The Nation, _never_ did I hear anyone say that he or she was ashamed of his country. It just isn't done"
First, I disagree with the observation: I have many French colleagues, and it is done. And I have native USSR born inlaws who have no problem whatsoever being ashamed of their mother country. I also know quite a few American citizens who are former Russian or French citizens, who clearly didn't take enough pride in their homeland to think it was worth staying there.
More importantly though, Michelle Obama never said she was ashamed of anything. She said that for the first time she was proud. There is a big difference. One is proud of those who exceed expectations - reach for the best in themselves, and then go beyond. If you're proud of "just enough" you're debasing pride and letting the object of your pride off the hook.
Furthermore, she was speaking extemporaneously in an emotionally charged moment - a situation that leads to hyperbole, as many of no doubt have had occasion to realize to our late discomfort.
I accept her explanation.
- sdemuth
February 21, 2008 at 8:39am
Liberos please! If a black person commenting on another milestone says she is now "really proud" her words shouldn't be parsed to mean that plain old proud=contempt. In my book blacks get a license. I'll bet a lot of blacks were "really proud" when the 14th Amendment was passed. And I'll bet Joe Louis was proud to serve in the Army but would have been "really proud to have served in a desegregated one. Tep, the last quarter century of Cold War-waging notwithstanding, blacks are allowed to emphasize and be "really proud" of racial progress. Weren't you "really proud" when the Senate finally just recently apologized for not outlawing lynching? And this from me, a conservative!
- lesserliz
February 21, 2008 at 9:49am
You know, about 95% of the time I think of O'Reilly's tirades and ridiculous bombastic focus on unimportant details in order to smear someone (almost always on the left). He uses all the rhetorical tricks to talk over and belittle lefties. But every now and then, he says something that shows some restraint and is reasonable. This is obviously a red-meat phrase, but maybe going after a guy's wife who until this moment has been pretty much considered sainted is maybe giving him pause...we'll see, I expect it will come back...
- dbhuff
February 21, 2008 at 11:26am
sdemuth - let's be precise. You're telling me that your French colleagues tell you that they're ashamed of France? Not frustrated, irritated, dispirited, but * ashamed *? Also, are these enarques or grads of the Grandes Ecoles? Remember, Michelle Obama and her husband have been showered with privileges due to their membership in the most prestigious US club there is.
I just don't see grads of the French equivalent of HLS uttering such statements, if only because it's pretty damned hard for any normal person anywhere to reconcile the dissonance of a) benefiting, hugely, from the access provided by the elite ticket your nation has afforded you, and b) feeling no sense of pride about that nation's achievements. The only way to reconcile this, emotionally, is to harbor a deep sense of grievance mixed with entitlement.
Not exactly the Obama-esque "breath of fresh air", or a post-racial post-hatred post-partisan impulse, now, is it?
Re the refugees from the USSR, these aren't typical Russians. I'd be surprised if the people you refer to are not entirely or mostly jewish refugees fleeing persecution per the implicit intent of Jackson-Vanik. Russian Jews have until very recently always considerd themselves at risk of another final solution (cf Stalin and the "Doctors' plot" scheme which only his death aborted), so their relationship to Russia needs to be considered as having more incommon with their relationship to, say, Germany or Poland.
- teplukhin2you
February 21, 2008 at 1:27pm
You've now made your way into hateful Tep. Why? You sound like John Birch.
I wonder why it is that you continue to either ignore or discount her right to have an experience as an American that is different from yours with every right to mention it as she sees fit. How can you possibly be more patriotically correct that Bill O'Reilly of all people and feel justified?
You act like she *owes you personally* a groveling thank you and a history lesson on America's perfection every time she opens her mouth. That bullying and fascistic, the last vestige and all that.
Frankly Tep - you're more offended at her perspective speaking as a black person than anything else, always an achilles heel of yours. You refuse to see that as valid perspective to speak from and always have.
I remember clearly your "pimping of melanin" lines, calling Obama Naomi Campbell and mentioning jeri curl more than once.
As an other poster commented once awhile ago and I agreed sadly but completey - when you speak of race, you are at your worst.
- Wandreycer1
February 21, 2008 at 1:38pm
PS Michelle Obama never said she was ashamed of anything - stop lying about what she said to further your ridiculous slander against her - at least tell the truth.
- Wandreycer1
February 21, 2008 at 1:41pm
Republican or Democrat and/or their biased pundits that follow them: you all slander each other for the sake of taking jabs at the people you fear will take power from your own hopefuls. None are trustworthy and at least Obama is letting it go as he should. The rest of the left wing and right wing haters, keep in mind: HELL IS BIG ENOUGH FOR BOTH OF YOU!! Go Libertarian!!!
- byron7
February 21, 2008 at 4:35pm
Has he clarified what he meant on national television? That's what she did.
Also, every time there a white person refers to "lynching" a black person, someone says, "why do we make a big deal out of the word lynch?" I think that response (and the continued acceptance of the confederate flag) is a very good example of how racism is so ingrained in our society that we can't untangle it from our subconscious.
Michell Obama (unlike her husband) is actually a descendent of slaves. It is probable that some of her ancestors were threatened withy lynching if they tried to escape. In that context, how can we assume that it would be okay to threaten her with lynching? I'm not saying suspend him, fire him or anything like that, but let's at least admit that it was impolite offensive.
Wouldn't we consider it highly offensive if someone referred to gassing a Jewish person who said something that person disagreed with? Would we give them a "break" because they didn't mean gas in the literal sense?
- Sirhc
February 21, 2008 at 5:44pm
Wandrey - where have I raised the issue of race here? Race has absolutely *nothing* to do with this.
Neither, frankly, does the issue of pride-- it was Michelle O. who for some unfathomable reason very explicitly chose that word and the odd sentence surrounding it. For my part I still have no clue as to what, other than a vaguely race-based jibe at god-knows-who, this woman is thinking.
The issue here is very simple: someone who wishes to lead this country, or speak on behalf of someone who wishes to lead this country, should have some awareness of the extraordinary achievements this country's made in the last quarter century, and some appreciation for those achievements. That's a matter of historical understanding, emotional and intellectual maturity, basic common sense.
Obama's wife is showing herself to be lacking in some or all of the above, and she deserves to be called on it-- even if doing so opens one up to all manner of BS accusations of "racism."
t
- teplukhin2you
February 21, 2008 at 6:48pm
And could we please cease with over-the-top BS about how her critics are asking for "a groveling thank you and a history lesson on America's perfection every time she opens her mouth."
I've said repeatedly on these boards that I want nothing to do with the Patriotically Correct crowd (you may recall that I was the one who used that term here first). She said that she had never been proud of her country before hubby started to get traction in his POTUS run.No one's asking for _Always_ Proud; the problem is her own weird, unprompted, surprisingly dumb (for an HLS grad, especially) formulation of _Never_ Proud. Her words, not mine.
You do see the difference, don't you? You do want the Dem candidate to win this thing, right?
- teplukhin2you
February 21, 2008 at 6:54pm