He was “jostled” at a street protest once.
by digby
According to CBS reports that day, O’Reilly’s claim that he was in “combat” in Argentina was reported by the network as a protest in which some reporters were “jostled.” There’s even footage featuring some Argentine businessmen in suits peering menacingly in the car of Canadian journalists as they sped off.
Bill O’Reilly covered a street demonstration which he has repeatedly and luridly recounted as combat experience. And he’s repeated it as a way of showing his wartime bonafides in contrast to other journalists (and even soldiers like John Kerry.) He is a liar.
You can see the CBS reports here at Mother Jones.
And even when O’Reilly wasn’t characterizing this incident as “combat” he was embellishing the story an pimping his own alleged heroism:
That’s not true. The riot police used rubber bullets and tear gas. There was trampling, at least one car et on fire and the usual chaos as the police fired tear gas and the crowd dispersed. Nobody was killed. If this was combat , then New York was an official battlefield during the Occupy protests.
As I’ve said before, the idea that this liar took Brian Williams to task for his exaggerations shows just proves what a pathologically dishonest hack he is. Williams was actually in the war zone. O’Reilly was covering (very briefly, I might add, since they sent him home almost immediately because he was such a jerk) some street demonstrations and has been passing himself off as Ernie Pyle ever since.
It’s intensely frustrating to see this bombastic jackass get away with this but he will. He’s the highest rated personality on Fox. Short of getting arrested for public lewdness (and even then …) there is nothing that will end his career. And even worse, all evidence of his deceit will be seen as further confirmation of his righteousness. It’s an awesome racket.
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