Bill O'Reilly, Outfoxed

Bill O'Reilly at the World Affairs Council of Philadelphia, September 30, 2010 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Bill O'Reilly was spun out of Fox News Channel Wednesday after two decades.  He was the longtime host of the network's most popular show "The O'Reilly Factor", where his confrontational style and unabashed conservative leanings set the example for other cable discussion shows to follow, for better or worse.

O'Reilly's departure came when his corporate bosses at 21st Century Fox (also known as the Murdoch empire) wearied of his reportedly having spawned several sexual harassment lawsuits, resulting in millions of dollars in "buy your silence" payouts to the women involved.  Fox had planned to keep O'Reilly on the air until at least 50 major advertisers pulled out of "The Factor".  Then they really had to do something.  As usual in corporate America, the bottom line counts more than the complaints of women.

Charges of sexual harassment have run rampant in recent years at FNC.  It's what caused Roger Ailes, who guided the network to its greatest success, to be shown the door.  It's also what caused some of its best-known personalities to seek employment elsewhere:  Gretchen Carlson (whose lawsuit against Ailes started all this), Megyn Kelly and Greta Van Susteren, among others, have all left.

Both O'Reilly and Ailes have denied the charges against them.

O'Reilly has at least one supporter in President Donald Trump, who has also been accused in the past of making unwanted advances towards women.  Takes one to know one, right?

Tucker Carlson has been announced by FNC as O'Reilly's replacement starting Monday.  Carlson's show had already replaced Kelly's in January when she moved to NBC News.

Fox News Channel is one of the top rated networks on cable, and leads CNN and MSNBC among all news channels by a distant margin.  It should remain that way even after O'Reilly's departure, because where else are Republicans and other conservatives going to go for what FNC promotes as "fair and balanced" news?  They will remain relevant as long as the current President of the United States trusts their information more than he trusts the classified briefings he gets.

As for Bill O'Reilly, he now has plenty of free time to work on his "Killing" book and TV-movie franchise ("Killing Kennedy", "Killing Reagan", etc.).  Maybe the next volume should be titled "Killing My Career".