O'Reilly continued to compare Daily Kos to Nazis and KKK


During the July 18 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor, while discussing JetBlue's decision to sponsor the YearlyKos convention, host Bill O'Reilly asserted that the blog Daily Kos is a “hate website[]” and opined: “There's no difference between the KKK and the Nazis, who have websites, than the Daily Kos. Because the Daily Kos is basically saying, 'We're allowing this kind of thing to come on.' ” O'Reilly then offered the following examples of the type of commentary that purportedly appears on Daily Kos: " 'It's good that [White House press secretary] Tony Snow has a recurrence of cancer; we hope he dies. We're sorry the assassination attempt against Dick Cheney failed; let them try again.' And on and on and on and on."

O'Reilly previously compared Daily Kos to the Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan on the July 16 edition of his program and, as Media Matters for America documented, defended this comparison the following night. O'Reilly maintained that "[t]he comparison is valid" and, in response to a viewer who said that O'Reilly “owe[d] me and thousands of others an apology” because “you should not compare anything to the Nazis,” asserted: “Hate is hate, sir. That website traffics in it, as do the Nazi websites. No difference.”

Additionally, the examples of Daily Kos content cited by O'Reilly appear to have come from user comments -- not Daily Kos blog posts. There is no reason to believe or suggest that the handful of offensive comments that O'Reilly singles out are in any way representative of the thousands of comments appearing on the site or the views of those who operate the site. For instance, O'Reilly's reference to Daily Kos “hop[ing]” that Snow “dies” apparently comes from a comment on a March 27 blog post. Part of the comment read:

Tony Snow... sadly the world may be better off without him, just as it would without a great many people like him. It's a strange conundrum -- you don't want to wish death on anyone, but you know that the world would likely, if not certainly be better off without the type of person that would choose to take the side of those willing to kill and abuse otherwise ordinary people in efforts to make money for themselves and their friends.

Likewise, O'Reilly's claim that Daily Kos expressed disappointment that “the assassination attempt against Dick Cheney failed” apparently comes from a comment on a satirical February 27 blog post titled “Cheney Unhurt in Bombing: Receives Medal of Honor.” The comment read: “BETTER LUCK NEXT TIME, TALIBAN.” On the July 16 edition of The O'Reilly Factor, O'Reilly quoted directly from both comments.

From the July 18 edition of Fox News' The O'Reilly Factor:

O'REILLY: Well, we called back -- because this just came in late this afternoon. We called back, and we said, “Look, we'd be happy to clarify this” -- as I just did -- “and we'd be happy to have Mr. Barger on the program.”

But we also asked JetBlue if they had done anything for the airline -- for the military, for American military people. Because they say, “Oh, we give free tickets to a lot of people.” Have you done anything for the American military? Then -- we'll be -- and I'm going to report tomorrow whether JetBlue has.

But here's what I think. The hate websites on both the left and the right -- I object to. You know I object to. Now, you're a little bit more a libertarian about this in our previous conversations.

But I say this. There's no difference between the KKK and the Nazis, who have websites, than the Daily Kos. Because the Daily Kos is basically saying, “We're allowing this kind of thing to come on. It's good that Tony Snow has a recurrence of cancer; we hope he dies. We're sorry the assassination attempt against Dick Cheney failed; let them try again.” And on and on and on and on.

I mean, this is the stuff that they have every day on this website, and they revel in it.

Now, am I overstating this? Because I think hate is hate, no matter where it is.