Mind over Media Matters

In a segment on the television program The O’Reilly Factor called “Talking Points,” airing September 14, 2007, host Bill O’Reilly expresses his disdain for an advertisement that recently ran in The New York Times under the heading “General Patraeus or General Betray Us,” which attacked the General for distorting data to suit his position on the Iraq war. O’Reilly, finding such a stance antipodal to his own, employs a slew of fallacious reasoning tactics to prop up his position and undermine that of his would-be detractors. To start, O’Reilly states that “there is no question the Democratic presidential contenders have a major problem” being that many of them had attended a Daily Kos convention (dun-dun-dun). He frames the Democrats as guilty by association, since they attended a convention organized by the Daily Kos, as he puts it, “one of the most vicious enterprises in the entire country,” thus implying that they, too, are a “vicious enterprise.” He also applies this assertion to all the Democratic presidential runners, generalizing from the actions of certain candidates.

He continues with a false dilemma. He condemns the Democratic candidates for their lack of outrage over the advertisement (according to O’Reilly); which he says leaves “independent-minded Americans . . . with the impression that the Democrats either agree with the vicious tactics of the far left or are too afraid to challenge them.” Not only is this a false dilemma, that the candidates are either malicious or cowardly, but it is also appeals to the emotions of his viewers through flattery, because his viewers are certainly the independent-minded Americans he speaks of. He follows up with an appeal to authority, albeit a left-wing bogeyman to his audience, and a false analogy when he mentions that other Democrats, “. . . even Nancy Pelosi,” have condemned the ad.

O’Reilly closes by pleading to his viewer’s sense of nationalism using the rationale of common belief when he says, “No American can win the presidency pandering to the far left. They may have a lot of money, a lot of internet clout, but they are seeking a huge change in America and most Americans simply don’t want it;” and “. . . that is dangerous and offensive to most Americans who reject far-left tactics and philosophy.” He refers to websites considered “far-left” as “internet assassins do[ing] the dirty work that the candidates used to do themselves,” and says, “in return for the assassinations, the candidates have to toe the line” of the far left. O’Reilly brings up Nixon for anecdotal evidence citing that “. . . Richard Nixon was reelected during the unpopular Vietnam War because his opponent, Senator George McGovern, lived in ‘far leftville.’” Finally, he adds that although far-right websites that “smear” exist, he has “studied this internet situation now for more than a year; the viciousness of the far left is unprecedented. It is un-American. It is immoral.” Again, this plays to the viewers’ emotions, loyalties, and trust.