O'Reilly vs. The Trib – Round One
In the red, white & blue trunks, “No Spin Zone" Factor fighter Bill O'Reilly; in the black, white & read all over thong: our own Daniel Ruth of The Tampa Tribune. The issue: a vote by the Hillsborough County School Board that dropped school holidays for Yom Kippur, Good Friday and the Muslim holiday Eid Al-Fitr.
For the story that sparked the fight club, click here.
It’s a natural. A Ruthian stand-off. A field of (bad) dreams. A major league . . . well, you get the metaphors.
To summarize, "A school board cannot recognize a religious holiday for the sole purpose of recognizing a religious holiday," sez School Board Attorney Tom Gonzalez.
Huh?
Then let’s all work Christmas, aye?
But TBM doesn’t have a dog in this fight. Ruth does. For what he said, in a story headlined “Bill O'Reilly's Lies, Lies, Lies Strike Again!” click here.
For those with limited time, or attention span, a few Ruthian tid-bits re: in & of O'Reilly:
* “Claptrap puffery”
* “Toxic waste dump of demagoguery.”
* “Serial sexual harasser.”
* “To whom a cell phone is an X-rated sex toy.”
* “When it comes to fascism, O'Reilly is an expert witness.”
Ah, come on, Dan. Don’t hold back. Tell us what ya reilly think.
And O'Reilly? Did we expect him to be a wallflower? Nope. Came on like gang-busters tonight (Wednesday, Nov. 2) with none other than Hillsborough County Commissioner Rhonda Storms. Now, note, that Storms is not on the School Board, but she knows which way the PR wind blows. (Pun intended.) Invited to attend was Hillsborough School Board member Jennifer Faliero, who was the Lone Ranger vote against the religious holiday ban – she declined.
Wrote Ruth: “Faliero just may have a prosperous career as an elected public servant, having figured out pretty quickly to avoid appearing on claptrap puffery like Bill O'Reilly's toxic waste dump of demagoguery.”
Gil Thelen, the Trib’s President and Publisher , was mentioned by O'Reilly (oh, really?) as was parent company Media General. Ruth (as near as TBM could tell) was not. Come on Dan. Storms said you are not on the intellectual scale of O'Reilly. Sounds like a challenge to me. (Would Judy Hamilton agree?) Give Bill a call. Let’s see if you can knock one out of the park. Don’t let him out-Fox you.
PS-1: Does anybody think this story is goin' away?
PS-2: Any bets on whether the vote gets reversed?
posted by Jim at 9:41 PM
6 Comments:
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Thank you for the compliment! I appreciate it very much : )
I'm ignoring the whole point of your post, but Christmas is a National Holiday.
I wow'd over at my place ; )
Still can't find the right eulogistic adjectives. It's my almost non-existent vocab that is to blame.
And by the way, I changed 'my brightest star' to 'my inspiration' as I thought the former to be redundant.
What do you think?
I wish we had a newspaper in Kansas City like you have in Tampa. In fact, I wish the folks at the Tampa Tribune would pack it in, and move here.
Ah...I still wouldn't buy it, or read it, or even line my parakeets cage with it.
You all down there in Florida have suffered from the wind too much.
Both: Reversed and it won't go away. ;-)
These attempts to eradicate Religious Freedoms, baffle me...
In Democracy we do not have a right to keep from being offended; we only have the right to express. And that includes freedom of worship. Either the school has 362 applications for request to add a Religious National Holiday, or the school system budget is making them work beyond the August recess. ;-)
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