Billy O Calls Slavery a Great Success

I think this might be it. I think it might be the day. I've been waiting for years now for Bill O'Reilly to say something stupid enough to actually alienate every person in America, to finally make the one clear, concise, declarative statement that informs everyone around of his total lack of perspective, his misplaced arrogance and his, well, complete and total absence of integrity or shame.

I mean, the guy is really dumb and talks shit all fucking day. I mean, he's got that hour-long televised abortion every afternoon on Fox News, and isn't his party against abortion in the first place? That'd be a good question for Harriet Miers during her confirmation hearings...

"Considering your clear stance against abortion rights, how would you rule if Bill O'Reilly's right to air his idiocy on nationwide television came before The Court...Mmm-hmmm...Right...I just mean, considering that his show is a daily televised abortion...Right...Please just answer the question."

As if that weren't enough chance for him spout his dim, generic brand of hate speech and propaganda, O'Reilly's on the radio nationwide every afternoon. Every afternoon. We're not just giving him enough rope to hang himself...We're giving him enough rope to hang himself, sail a frigate across the Atlantic and then construct a tent village once he arrives on the other side.

And, as I said, I think all that yammering might have finally paid off. I give you quite possibly The Dumbest Thing Billy O Has Ever Said:

My people came from County Cavan in Ireland. All right? And the British Crown marched in there with their henchman, Oliver Cromwell, and they seized all of my ancestors' lands, everything. And they threw them into slavery, pretty much indentured servitude on the land. And then the land collapsed, all right? And everybody was starving in Ireland. They had to leave the country, just as Africans had to leave -- African-Americans had to leave Africa and come over on a boat and try to make in the New World with nothing. Nothing. And succeeded, succeeded. As did Italians, as did -- and I'll submit to you, African-Americans are succeeding as well. So all of these things can be overcome I think, [caller]. Go ahead.

Are you yanking full handfuls of hair by the roots from out your scalp yet? You realize that Bill O'Reilly, a pompous, wealthy white man, has said on the radio for a national audience that Africans had to leave Africa because of famine.

Well, I suppose it is possible that there were sporadic famines in Africa in the 15th, 16th, 17th and 18th Centuries, but I think the reason all those Africans had less to do with that and more to do with the angry white guys pointing guns at their heads and putting them in shackles. Unless, you know, it was a combination of the two.

"Hey, Kunta, I don't think I'm gonna go with these white guys. I think they mean to put us to work when we get to the New World, possibly without the benefits of a good 401k package."

"Shut the hell up, Mfufe! You'll blow the whole deal! There was a gourd shortage last year! This may be our last chance to propser in America!"

Ummm...no...Not quite, Bill. You see, your ancestors, the Irish people, came to America by choice because there wasn't any food left in Ireland and they were living under the oppressive thumb of the British government. The ancestors of all the black people came to America by no choice of their own. They wanted to stay behind. They couldn't bring anything with them, not their families, their language, their culture, their music. NOTHING. They had to create an entire civilization all over again, thousands of miles away, while living under the far more oppressive thumb of racist backwoods white assholes like yourself.

I know Billy O's daily radio audience has got to be a differently-abled bunch. They can't learn new concepts with the rapidity of you or me. It takes a long time for information to sink into their dense, Cro-Magnon-like craniums. But is there any American out there in 2005 that doesn't understand the massive, horrific and utterly destructive legacy of slavery? Really? For real? I don't believe you...

And yet, here's Bill, clearly pretending not to understand this relatively simple fact, one that you'd glean just by observing American demographics and culture. I mean, "Africans had to make it in the New World with nothing?" Is working on some fat fuck's plantation really considered "making it"? I mean, you know, work at it long enough, maybe you'll move up from field to house. But that's about as far as you're going to go.

We didn't let "Africans" vote until the 1960's. How can that be considered bringing them over here to make it? The Irish had a chance to make it, mostly in the police force, albeit suffering from some prejudices themselves once they arrived in America. What can I say? We're an equal-opportunity xenophobe here in the US, and always have been.