Talking points

O’Reilly: An accusation of racism

Bill O’Reilly is getting “a bum rap,” said Clarence Page in the Chicago Tribune. For the past week, the irascible Fox News pundit has been roasted in the national media for comments he made about his visit to Sylvia’s, the legendary Harlem soul-food restaurant. “There wasn’t one person in Sylvia’s who was screaming, ‘M-f’er, I want more iced tea!’” O’Reilly told radio listeners. “It was like going into an Italian restaurant in an all-white suburb . . . There wasn’t any kind of craziness at all.”

To understand those remarks, said Juan Williams in Time.com, you have to put them into context. O’Reilly was interviewing me at the time, and we were discussing how gangsta rap had promoted a stereotype of blacks as “ignorant, oversexed, and violent.” He talked about his dinner at Sylvia’s, and how the people he saw there were totally unlike the thugs glorified by rappers. But because O’Reilly is an outspoken conservative, the liberal “watchdog” group Media Matters strung together his juicier quotes to make him sound like a racist. It’s a cheap shot.

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