Bill O'Reilly and the Media Mobius Strip

It seems that whenever conservative commentator Bill O' Reilly tries to justify his stance against the perceived enemies of the U.S. in the Middle East he ends up sounding closer to the terrorists than he realizes. And when he speaks out against the mass media, the man simply shoots himself in the foot.

Take, for instance, Mr. O'Reilly's view on how a “sane” world would deal with Iran:

“You know, in a sane world, every country would unite against Iran and blow it off the face of the earth. That would be the sane thing to do.”

Lovely. But what about all those women and children? The elderly? The Kabob vendors, for Pete's? All fair game in O' Reilly's view. Which actually sounds eerily similar to a certain terrorist.

Here's Osama Bin Laden's view on American terror targets:

"We do not differentiate between those dressed in military uniforms and civilians; they are all targets in this fatwa." Osama Bin Laden 1998

Scary? Well, it IS Bill O' Reilly, so one must take his comments with a grain of salt, but he does represent a lot of what is wrong with the mobius strip that is our media.

Here's another choice sample:

Last month, retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez made the dubious claim that the press is “perpetuating” partisan politics which, he claimed, bares some responsibility for the deaths of American troops in Iraq and the Middle East.

O'Reilly was quick to point out that Sanchez must have been referring to The New York Times and NBC News-- not Fox News. He concluded in his Talking Points Memo that “the U.S. media is full of corrupt ideologues who put their world view above honest information. This is not only putting our military in danger, ladies and gentlemen, it puts all of us in danger.”

The cliché “ignorance is bliss” comes to mind.