Reacting to the media coverage thus far of the deadly church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina, Fox News contributor Bernard Goldberg joined Thursday’s O’Reilly Factor on the Fox News Channel and eviscerated the liberal media for having “a long, detestable history” of using instances of innocent lives being senselessly lost “as an opportunity to bash conservative media.”
When host Bill O’Reilly asked Goldberg for his reaction to how the Factor coverage had been thus far, Goldberg complimented how O’Reilly had handled the Charleston tragedy before making his broader comments about the media.
First alluding to it as “a certain kind of coverage” which “isn’t new” to the media landscape in that: “There are people in the media, some people in the media, who will use an opportunity of innocent people being killed in a church as an opportunity to bash conservative media and it has a long, detestable history.”
Goldberg’s first example was the 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City where, in the aftermath, “liberals in the media blamed Rush Limbaugh and talk radio” for it being supposedly “their fault.”
Moving next to the January 2011 deadly shooting in Tucson, Arizona, Goldberg brought up The New York Times for claiming “without a shred of evidence” that the “insane lunatic” shooting “was influenced by right-wing rhetoric.” While on that topic, the author of the bestseller book Bias mentioned far-left online magazine Salon who “said our Fox News and the right wing media encourag[ed] violence.”
Coming lastly to Charleston, Goldberg slammed O’Reilly’s previous guest in South Carolina Democratic State Representative Todd Rutherford for making “those same ridiculous, ridiculous, slanderous comments on CNN” in connecting Fox News to the motivations of alleged shooter Dylann Roof.
Goldberg then explained this mindset in the liberal media futher:
There are people in the media, Bill, who can't help themselves. They will not let an opportunity, a crisis, they will not let a crisis go to waste. Even when the crisis involves nine innocent people being killed in a church. I'm not blaming CNN for that, but I am blaming Salon and others on the right – on the left, who– who their first reaction, their gut reaction is always to blame right-wing rhetoric for things, without any evidence to support it.
For the remainder of the segment, O’Reilly and Goldberg also criticized President Obama and Hillary Clinton for speaking out in favor of gun control when addressing the shooting at Emmanuel AME Church with the full story not yet known.
In addition, the pair debated the feelings among millennials regarding race with O’Reilly arguing that it has become “way too acceptable” for people of different races to disparage each other by “using these terrible words to define others of a different race and this seems to be okay now.”
The relevant part of the transcript from FNC’s The O’Reilly Factor on June 19 can be found below.
FNC’s The O’Reilly Factor
June 18, 2015
8:38 p.m. Eastern
BERNARD GOLDBERG: But there is a certain kind coverage, Bill, that isn't new either. There are people in the media, some people in the media, who will use an opportunity of innocent people being killed in a church as an opportunity to bash conservative media and it has a long, detestable history. After Oklahoma City bombing, liberals in the media blamed Rush Limbaugh and talk radio. It was their fault. After the massacre in Arizona, The New York Times, without a shred of evidence, said that this insane lunatic, who did the killings, was influenced by right-wing rhetoric are. Then, you had on Salon, a prominent online liberal magazine. They said our Fox News and the right wing media encouraging violence and then the guest you had on right before, he made those same ridiculous, ridiculous, slanderous comments on CNN and the anchor, who’s usually a good guy, and he looked troubled to his credit. The anchorman looked troubled when he blamed things like Fox for what happened today. He let it go. He didn't challenge it. There are people in the media, Bill, who can't help themselves. They will not let an opportunity, a crisis, they will not let a crisis go to waste. Even when the crisis involves nine innocent people being killed in a church. I'm not blaming CNN for that, but I am blaming Salon and others on the right – on the left, who– who their first reaction, their gut reaction is always to blame right-wing rhetoric for things, without any evidence to support it.
BILL O’REILLY: Now, the politicians, though, today on the left, you didn't hear too many of the Republicans people get involved with policy, but you did hear President Obama and Hillary Clinton say the guns, the guns, the guns, the guns, the guns and tomorrow, we will get into that in a pretty interesting way because we are investigating all of these gun atrocities and I will tell you how to stop them. It's not hard to stop a gun deal on gun crimes in America. However, I thought it was inappropriate for the President and for Mrs. Clinton to bring that up today because they know there is two sides to this story.
GOLDBERG: Well, the appropriateness aside, you can deal with that tomorrow. The appropriateness aside, I would be in favor of the toughest gun control laws when they involve lunatics. I don't want lunatics having guns. The toughest constitutional laws I would support, but what the President didn't say when he brought this up today is: How do you stop a father, a dopey father from giving his idiot, racist son a gun on his 21st birthday that he uses to kill nine people? In Connecticut, it was the mother's gun. The mother's gun. So, if you could tell me not you, tonight, but the President or Hillary Clinton could tell me what law they think could stop stupid parents from doing stupid things that lead to mass murder, I'm all ears.
