I thought the Bill O'Reilly/Al Franken dust-up on C-Span was interesting in a World Wrestling Federation sense. Franken did manage to nail O'Reilly on a lie, and O'Reilly responded about as Franken would have scripted it: By trying to shout him down and demand that the topic be changed. That's the modus operandi of just about everyone who hosts a political discussion kind of show these days. When was the last time Rush Limbaugh participated in a discussion where he couldn't shut off his opponent with the push of a button? The thing about O'Reilly is that he goes on other folks' shows, or appears on panels where he has equal status as the other speakers, and expects to control what is and isn't discussed — and usually, he succeeds. Just before the luncheon with Franken and Molly Ivins, O'Reilly appeared on a live phone-in interview and every time a caller got near a topic that O'Reilly didn't like, he insulted them and bullied the interviewer into going to the next call.
Anyway, if you want to see the brouhaha, you have two choices. C-Span (or maybe C-Span2) is rerunning it on Sunday. Consult their website for the exact time.
Or if you have RealPlayer installed, you can watch it online, at least for a while, at this website. Scroll down the page until you find it. According to Rob Means…
It's an hour and a half long, and starts with Molly Ivins (worth watching in her own right). O'Reilly's talk begins at about the 18 minute mark; Franken starts at about 29:00 (and ends "35 minutes later", at 48:30). Be sure to watch O'Reilly's body language during Franken's talk — it's hysterical. He starts talking about O'Reilly at about 41:15. O'Reilly tells him to "Shut up" at 49:00.
Actually, I liked Molly Ivins more than either of the guys…but I'll tell you what I think was going through O'Reilly's mind as Franken dragged him through the mud. O'Reilly's a smart guy and I think he was thinking, "Franken's found a great act. He's going to make a ton of money — selling books, getting lecture gigs, maybe even getting a radio show up and running — by attacking me and other conservatives. So we're going to hear a lot of it." A lot of folks got rich and famous via Clinton-bashing and there's a growing market for rip jobs on Bush and the right wing.