Anyone who believes that libertarianism is just a far right faction of conservatism would have learned otherwise if they had watched Bill O'Reilly's interview with John Stossel on The O'Reilly Factor on Fox News, October 20.
O'Reilly is generally described as a conservative. But a Publisher's Weekly review of his book on Amazon.com, Culture Warrior, describes him as a "traditionalist" who condemns the "erosion of societal discipline" flowing from an alleged "secular-progressive" agenda of drug legalization and other evils.
It's little wonder, then, that once the introductory pleasanties were over, O'Rielly's first question went like this: "Stossel's a libertarian which means he doesn't want government intrusion in our lives, that's primarily what it means, you want government to stay away, so therefore you want to legalize pot, right?"
From there the "interview" essentially turned into an O'Rielly rant against drugs with Stossel as his on-camera audience.
Stossel, of course, is much more than a drug legalizer.
His profile page on the Advocates for Self-Government website introduces him as "arguably the highest-profile libertarian journalist in the world."
The same article chronicles how Stossel joined ABC's "20/20" in 1981 where he won 19 Emmy awards and was honored five times for excellence in consumer reporting by the National Press Club. But along the way he became increasingly skeptical of government.
That's when the awards quit coming. In his book, Give Me a Break, Stossel wrote: "I was once a heroic consumer reporter. Now I'm a threat to journalism...I did a terrible thing. Instead of just applying my skepticism to business, I applied it to government."
Stossel left ABC this September for a multi-year deal with Fox Business Network and the Fox News Channel where, according to a Fox news release, he will anchor "Stossel," a weekly one-hour program on FOX Business.
The Stossel-O'Reilly exchange over drug legalization is available on Youtube.
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Comments
O'Reilly needed to just shut his pie-hole for a minute and listen to logic and reason. He just made himself look like a dogmatic idiot - and a spoiled brat - who puts his fingers in his ears and says "LaLaLaLa! I'm NOT listening!"
Anyone who reads this: Please e-mail John Stossel and tell him to stop making appearances with Bill O'Reilly. There is no reason for Stossel, an outstanding journalist, to appear with a guy who just wants to shout him down. Silliness.
Isn't that what O'Reilly always does?
That's O'Reilly's modus operandi. He's never there for informed debate. He's there to browbeat.
Good to see more of Stossel.
The Drug War has traditionally been a big government far leftist indulgence. Tip O'Neal and LBJ loved it. As a coservative, this is why I love Stossel, and hate FOX news. The drug war has been going on since the Whisky Rebellion.
O'Reilly still has the mentality of the Nixon years of old propaganda. Wake up and smell the pot Bill!
Bill seems like he feels feels threatened... Is Fox news going to start leaning more libertarian?
There's still some people who can be swayed from logic by hysterically shouting "Think of the children!" (Bill didn't invent that), but their numbers seem to be dwindling every day.
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