Bill O’Reilly vs. Michael Jackson
Did the Fox News star’s rant against Jackson go too far?
At least Bill O’Reilly “waited until Michael Jackson was completely dead and buried to spit on his grave,” said Duncan Riley in The Inquisitr. In his Fox News show, O’Reilly launched an “amazing attack” on Jackson and on the “cowardly” media’s coverage of his death. He slams Jackson for being selfish, backs Rep. Peter King’s pedophile charge, then says Jackson can't be an African-American icon because he bleached his skin and has white children. (watch video)
“My stomach churns” at having to say this, but there’s “some truth” to Bill O’Reilly's statements, said Trey Ellis in The Huffington Post. Of course we should be letting his family grieve and celebrating his music, but “we in the black community” should also think about why we’re “closing ranks” on the “most famous black man in the world,” who’d convinced himself he was “a perpetually 12-year-old white boy.”
This isn’t really so much about Jackson, said Yosef Solomon in Manolith. It’s about creating controversy so people will pay attention to Bill O’Reilly, and thus Fox’s “right-wing propaganda.” By the way, Fox was one of the major media outlets giving wall-to-wall coverage to Michael Jackson’s death, so O’Reilly’s rant against the media is “meaningless and without merit.”
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