June 10th, 2009
Brandon Caselman | An insurance agent who lost his license over his million-dollar “advice.”10 comments
June 3rd, 2009
Karla Keller | Worse than parking tickets: Drinking and driving.28 comments
May 27th, 2009
Ken Allen, Dan Clay, Tom Chamberlain | Look for the union label.20 comments
May 20th, 2009
Ed Kraus | Oy vey. Slapping down an open hand.3 comments
May 6th, 2009
Bakke Properties | Who’s the real vermin?6 comments
April 29th, 2009
Laurie Monnes Anderson | Wrong time to kill a watchdog.5 comments
April 22nd, 2009
Mayor Sam Adams | One deal too many.26 comments
April 15th, 2009
Portland Revenue Bureau | A wheel pain for local business.0 comments
April 8th, 2009
12 Lanes | We like these signs of dissent.6 comments
April 1st, 2009
Rev. E. William Beauchamp | Censorship isn’t a Christian value.10 comments
 |
[June 25th, 2008]
For mischaracterizing a Portland school principal’s actions and deluging her with hate mail from his whack-job Fox TV viewers, ex-KATU gasbag Bill O’Reilly sweeps this week’s highest ratings from the Rogue Desk.
Last Thursday, O’Reilly devoted a segment of his The O’Reilly Factor to discussing a minor brouhaha over the Pledge of Allegiance at Capitol Hill Elementary in Southwest Portland earlier this month.
Principal Pam Wilson had decided her fifth-grade students should recite the preamble to the Constitution at their graduation ceremony June 10 instead of the Pledge. When one mom asked why, Wilson gave a clumsy answer about wanting the ceremony to be inclusive. She thought the pledge’s words “under God” were not. But the mom was enraged. So she shared Wilson’s response with the media.
First, Lars Larson took up the cause. Then O’Reilly went on national TV to say Wilson had “banned” the Pledge. Not really. But at least 60 angry emails landed on Wilson and Portland Public Schools anyway. “YOU SCUMBAG AMERICAN HATING BASTARDS,” one viewer wrote in all caps. “THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE IS NOT OFFENSIVE TO US AND IF IT OFFENDS ANYONE THEN FUCK THEM.... I WISH AN EARTHQUAKE WOULD REMOVE THE WHOLE LEFT COAST.”
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A Fox spokesman said the broadcast was accurate. So we’ll end with O’Reilly’s own quote on the topic and replace “educators” with “cable news bloviators” and “kids” with “television viewers”:
“If you let the crazy educators [or cable news bloviators] run wild, which they are in many, many parts of the country, then we’re just going to lose the country, because the kids [and television viewers] are confused. They don’t know what the heck is going on.”
So true, O’Reilly. So true.
RECENT COMMENTS ON “Bill O’Reilly”
When exactly was it that the religious right and, ostensibly, the Republican Party turned against public education? The founding fathers, to whom they on the right are so intent in referring, support...
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This is making a mountain out of a molehill. As one of the parents of a 5th grade students singing the preamble I was proud of my daughter and her classmates. Only one parent had an objection and im...
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