| All content taken from The O'Reilly Factor on Fox News Channel. Each weeknight by 6 PM EST a preview of that evening's show will be posted and then updated with additional information the following weekday by noon EST.
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| "The Obama administration has trouble on three fronts - the IRS illegally investigating conservatives, the assassination of Libya ambassador Christopher Stevens, and the Justice Department secretly obtaining the phone records of some journalists. The President has fired the acting head of the IRS, but there is deep suspicion in some circles that the liberal Obama administration created an atmosphere where far-left zealots in the IRS were basically unsupervised. There is also suspicion because, after eight months, the Benghazi deal has not been fixed. Today the President fell back on an old canard, calling on Congress to spend more to secure our embassies. But the screw-up in Libya was solely the fault of bad management in Washington, and why Mr. Obama would want to re-visit the spending deal is a mystery to me. The President is on more solid ground when he speaks about the Associated Press controversy. About 20 phone lines were secretly scrutinized by the Justice Department to find leaks related to national security. Talking Points believes that's a legitimate concern and in the war on terror covert operations have to be protected to some extent. But there's always the abuse of power question: Did the Justice Department go too far? Instead of solving problems, President Obama and most every other modern president try to deflect them. This has been a tough week for the administration, and in order to salvage his credibility Mr. Obama must be very aggressive in explaining to the American public exactly what happened and why. So far he has not done that." |
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Guests: Charles Krauthammer
The Factor invited FNC's Charles Krauthammer to evaluate the Talking Points Memo and the trio of issues plaguing the Obama administration. "What's going on here," Dr. K said, "is that you have a president who came to Washington saying he was going to change the essence of politics itself and is now reduced to trying to explain why his whole bureaucracy is out of control. His best answer, although it makes him looks ridiculous, is to take the position that he's just a bystander. Their best defense is sheer incompetence in running the government!" Krauthammer also theorized that one scandal stands out above the others. "The one that is the most dangerous to the President is the IRS scandal. That's what everybody is viscerally upset about, everybody understands the power of the IRS. They want us to believe that a bunch of bureaucrats in Cincinnati got together and decided to target the right, but that's not a plausible story and we now know it came from Washington." |
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Guests: Mark Zaid
The Obama administration has thus far indicted six federal employees for leaking classified information, more than any prior administration. The Factor discussed the war on leaks with attorney Mark Zaid, who specializes in national security cases. "Leaks need to be prosecuted," Zaid affirmed, "because a leak could lead to someone's death. But what's different in this administration is the evidence - they have had access to emails and phone records and they've been able to prosecute. This is no longer the days of Woodward and Bernstein meeting Deep Throat in a parking lot." But Zaid criticized the White House for not living up to its promises. "This administration, coming in on its grounds of 'transparency,' has done little to nothing to protect whistle blowers. There's no mechanism for people to come forward and express their concerns to someone inside the government." |
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Guests: Bonny Forrest and Wendy Walsh
Some young women are actually fawning over Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the surviving Boston Marathon bomb suspect. Mental health experts Wendy Walsh and Bonnie Forrest explained the bizarre phenomenon. "This is called hybristophilia or 'Bonnie and Clyde syndrome,'" Forrest said. "There are a lot of theories about why this happens, but I think for these girls this is about getting fifteen minutes of fame and attention. I think this is like Justin Bieber for them." Walsh contended that the teen girls have been corroded by modern culture. "One massive study showed that adolescent values changed dramatically over just ten years. In 1997 some of the top values included community feelings and kindness, then just ten years later at the top of the list were celebrity, fame, self-image, and financial success. To these girls, celebrity is what matters." Whatever the psychological explanations, The Factor was stunned by the affection shown to a murderer: "They don't see the death and destruction, arms and legs blowing off people, and an 8-year-old being killed. It doesn't enter into their minds!" |
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Guests: Rep. Darrell Issa
The Factor was joined by Congressman Darrell Issa, head of the House Oversight Committee and one of President Obama's most indefatigable critics. "There is a broad pattern here," Issa said, "where agency after agency exceed their jurisdiction. The administration is great at issuing executive orders, but lousy at getting legislation through or even complying with existing laws. And when it comes to transparency, the American people are the losers." Issa heaped scorn on the President's pending appointment of Assistant Attorney General Thomas Perez to be Secretary of Labor. "Perez has given false statements to Congress and violated the Federal Records Act. He told us he had no private email addresses, but now we find out there are 35. If he's confirmed he'll be controlling a lot of labor policy and union activities, and he's ideologically driven." The Factor concluded that the Obama administration is dominated by zealots, saying, "It looks to me like the climate that has been created here is that you can do whatever you want if you are on the ideological and liberal team." |
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Guests:Laura Ingraham
Conservative radio talk show host Laura Ingraham looked back at what is almost surely the worst week in President Obama's tenure. "The President came across, even to his supporters, as removed from Washington," she opined. "He talks about Washington as if he floats above it, but he's the chief executive officer and he seems like an incompetent manager of his people." Ingraham also theorized that President Obama's difficulties could be a boon for her side. "Conservative thought is that government needs to shrink and needs to be starved of money and power because you can't hold these huge bureaucracies accountable." |
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Norm Roche, Clearwater, FL: "Mr. O'Reilly, President Obama did not fire the IRS chief. He resigned. There's a big difference."
Carl Hafner, Copaigue, NY: "The Cranky Old Republicans are using Benghazi to divert attention away from immigration reform."
Larry Harlan, San Diego, CA: "Kirsten Powers uses the word 'lies' when talking about President Obama. But I know you, Bill, would never say that out of fear." |
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| Benjamin Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanack, written more than 250 years ago, is still a great read filled with sage advice and pithy adages. |
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