Guests:Patty Duke & Connie Francis
"Authorities in Marin County, California have told the world that Robin Williams hanged himself in his bedroom. The media is playing the Williams story big and some believe it might be too much, but Talking Points does not believe the coverage is overdone because this is a very important story. Apparently Robin Williams suffered from depression, as 16-million Americans do, and it was the depression that likely caused him to take his own life. Mr. Williams was one of the last entertainment icons, meaning that most of the country knew him and his vast talent. Today we are a fractured society, and never again will entertainers like Williams be so prominent in the nation's mind. Mr. Williams had a unique talent. I saw him at Carnegie Hall a few years ago and almost his entire act was extemporaneous, off the cuff. Brilliance doesn't even begin to cover it. His peers knew that, they understood the giant talent of Robin Williams. It is a sad fact that many creative artists are tortured souls. Ernest Hemingway committed suicide, so did Kurt Cobain, and hundreds of other artists have destroyed themselves with drugs and alcohol. There is a unique pressure on famous people. Everyone has high expectations of them, and it is very difficult to live as a normal human being. I met Robin Williams one time at Yankee Stadium. He seemed to be a good guy, he made everybody in the box laugh, and he was very courteous. So the nation mourns the death of Robin Williams, and hopefully all of us will become more aware of the depression situation. It is a terrible disease, but one that can be overcome.

The Factor spoke with Patty Duke and Connie Francis, two stars who also suffered from depression. "I've been sent involuntarily to mental institutions 15 times," Francis revealed, "where you're in shackles and put in isolation. But my family finally told me to get off my behind and get going and do something about it." Duke expressed her reaction to hearing about Williams' suicide. "I just screamed, 'no, no, no.' I wondered why he, of all people, couldn't get the help he needed - perhaps his illness was as unique as his creative genius. I suffered from bipolar illness from 35 years, which was completely out of control except when I was working. I tortured my family and I was abusive to my children until finally I was treated with medication. For the first time in my life I was able to make decisions for myself."

Guest:Bernie Goldberg
FNC's Bernie Goldberg assessed the coverage of Robin Williams' suicide. "There's a rule of thumb," he began, "which is when a famous person dies an untimely death it will get a lot of coverage. Part of the reason is that we live in the 'United States of Entertainment.' News producers understand that people who get bored after 10 seconds of news about Ukraine will watch 10 hours of news about Robin Williams. The truth is that this gets so much coverage because even in death Robin Williams brings in numbers." The Factor added that the media has undergone a dramatic transformation: "30 years ago the death of Robin Williams wouldn't have received wall-to-wall coverage, it all changed with the death of John Kennedy Jr."

Guest:Karl Rove
Some Democrats, Hillary Clinton among them, have been critical of President Obama's foreign policy. The Factor asked FNC's Karl Rove to analyze. "Hillary Clinton wants to divorce herself from Barack Obama," Rove theorized, "whose popularity on foreign affairs is at an all-time record low. She wants to separate herself from the failures of the administration, which causes some people on the left of her party to come out against her. On the other hand, she has to somehow convince people that she should not be held responsible, even though she was Secretary of State for four years." The Factor reminded Rove that the GOP's record is also unpopular: "The Republican Party's foreign policy in Iraq and Afghanistan looks horrible to regular folks. They see Afghanistan and Iraq as not being worth it!"

Guests:Monica Crowley & Kirsten Powers
The Factor asked Monica Crowley and Kirsten Powers about Democratic dissatisfaction with President Obama's foreign policy. "I would not say the party is divided," Powers opined. "Some people are criticizing him, but they are few and far between. I don't think Hillary Clinton is in sync with most Democrats on the issue of saying we should have been arming the Syrian rebels." Crowley insisted that her Republican Party will benefit from the chaos in the Middle East and around the world. "Americans like to win and we did win in Iraq, but now Barack Obama is in the process of losing. So the Republicans may have an opening in saying that we had the situation relatively stable, we had victory in our sights and this president has lost it."

Guest:Dr. Ben Carson
The St. Louis suburb of Ferguson has been hit by protests and looting after a police officer shot and killed an unarmed black teenager. Dr. Ben Carson, a Tea Party favorite and prospective Republican presidential candidate, assessed the situation. "I think these people have not studied history," Carson said of the looters. "The reason Martin Luther King was so effective is because he quelled the temptation toward violence and brought a lot of attention to injustices. If in fact an injustice has been done in this case, these people are actually detracting from the injustices by rioting and hurting people. They're not helping the young man's family, and I hope there will be some leaders who will point that out to them. We need to hear from this police officer, we need to understand why he decided to shoot to kill and not shoot to stop."

Guest:Charles Krauthammer
Charles Krauthammer, who has denounced President Obama for allowing evildoers to run wild around the world, tried to analyze the president's inaction. "I think it starts with the series of speeches he gave after being sworn in 2009," Dr. K said. "It was a 'confessional tour' where he spoke about all the sins America had committed. I think he's one of the rare presidents who really thinks that America has done more harm than good, and I think he sees his role as restraining American power. He presented himself to the nation as the man who would end the wars, this is his self-image, so to act decisively would be a contradiction of his self-image." The Factor specifically criticized the president's lethargy regarding Iraq: "He doesn't come across as someone who is irrational, but President Obama and his advisors knew that ISIS was growing in ferocity and power, that they would rape people and enslave people. For one solid year the most powerful man in the world allowed ISIS to murder human beings at will."

We would all do well to follow the lead of the Wolcott County Fair in Connecticut, which is donating all its parking fees this coming weekend to help wounded veterans.