During his “Beat the Press” segment on the July 31 editions of MSNBC's Tucker and Scarborough Country, MSNBC host Tucker Carlson highlighted Fox News host Bill O'Reilly's comments made on the July 26 broadcast of Westwood One's The Radio Factor, which Media Matters for America documented on July 28. O'Reilly declared that "[t]he reason we're not winning in Iraq" is that the United States is “not tough enough” to take actions like “level[ing] Fallujah ... and blow[ing] the hell out of it," moments before announcing, “You're not gonna win the war being macho.” Carlson described O'Reilly's solution in Iraq as follows: "[J]ust level it, turn it into a parking lot, an ice rink, just kill everybody, knock every building down, pulverize it to dust! On the other hand, macho solutions are no solutions." Carlson concluded: “This is what happens when cable news does foreign policy. Bill O'Reilly, he's an intellectual.”

From the July 31 edition of MSNBC's Tucker:

CARLSON: First up, Fox's Bill O'Reilly. On his radio talk show last week, O'Reilly offered his critique of American foreign policy. Confused about what we ought to be doing in Iraq and the Middle East? Here's Bill O'Reilly's solution.

[begin audio clip]

O'REILLY: The reason we're not winning in Iraq, in my opinion, is because we didn't level Fallujah when we should have leveled it. Level it. Give every civilian 24 hours to get out and blow the hell out of it.

[...]

I'm an intellectual. I mean, macho doesn't get you anywhere in this world. It really doesn't. You swagger around being a macho guy, and you're not going to get anywhere.

LIS WIEHL [Fox News legal analyst and Radio Factor co-host]: You can be macho and swagger and still be smart.

O'REILLY: You're not going to win -- no, you're not going to win the war being macho.

[end video clip]

CARLSON: Let's see, the solution in Iraq is just level it, turn it into a parking lot, an ice rink, just kill everybody, knock every building down, pulverize it to dust. On the other hand, macho solutions are no solutions. This is what happens when cable news does foreign policy. Bill O'Reilly, he's an intellectual.

From the July 31 edition of MSNBC's Scarborough Country:

CARLSON: Time now for “Beat the Press,” a segment we do every day on my show at 4 and 6 Eastern. First up, Fox's Bill O'Reilly. On his talk radio show last week, O'Reilly offered his critique of American foreign policy. Confused about what we ought to be doing in Iraq? Well, here's Bill O'Reilly's solution.

[begin audio clip]

O'REILLY: The reason we're not winning in Iraq, in my opinion, is because we didn't level Fallujah when we should have leveled it. Level it. Give every civilian 24 hours to get out and blow the hell out of it.

[...]

I'm an intellectual. I mean, macho doesn't get you anywhere in this world. It really doesn't. You swagger around being a macho guy, and you're not going to get anywhere.

WIEHL: You can be macho and swagger and still be smart.

O'REILLY: You're not going to win -- no, you're not going to win the war being macho.

[end video clip]

CARLSON: Let's see. The solution in Iraq is just level it, turn it into a parking lot, an ice rink, just kill everybody, knock every building down, pulverize it to dust! On the other hand, macho solutions are no solutions. This is what happens when cable news does foreign policy. Bill O'Reilly, he's an intellectual.