Bill O'Reilly on science: Why is Earth the only planet with a moon?
As my blogmate Jim Rainey has frequently pointed out, Fox News has its own unique view of the world, where the facts rarely get in the way, most recently in the way Fox pollster Frank Luntz used a strange brand of faux science to find a panel of people unimpressed by President Obama's recent State of the Union address. But when it comes to seeing the world through the wrong end of a telescope, no one tops Bill O'Reilly, who has been the butt of a thousand jokes after confronting an atheist on his show with irrefutable evidence of the existence of God--using as his evidence the fact that the tides come in and the tides go out. I mean, O'Reilly said with great certainty, who else could possibly be controlling that?
As any scientist could tell you, it's the moon that controls the tides. So Papa Bear has taken to the airwaves again to pursue a new wrinkle in his faux science agenda. He now acknowledges that the tides might indeed be controlled by the moon. But so what? As he says: "How'd the moon get there? Can you explain that to me? How come we have that? And Mars doesn't have it. Venus doesn't have it. How come?"
Actually, as any amateur astronomer knows, Jupiter has lots of moons, 63 in all, several of which you can see through a good pair of binoculars. One of them, Ganymede, is actually larger than Mercury. Saturn has 62 moons. Uranus has 27 moons. And hey, Bill, Mars actually has two moons of its own, that were discovered in 1877, long before even Roger Ailes was born. As far as I know, there's no evidence that either of them are made of green cheese either. I'm beginning to think that O'Reilly might have slept through quite a few of his fifth-grade science classes. But he sure is certain in his beliefs. Here, watch for yourself:
--Patrick Goldstein
Irrespective of my thoughts on Mr. Obama's State of the Union Address, this comment "Why is Earth the only planet with a moon?" is just one of many reasons for giving little credence to Mr. O'Reilly's statements or watch his show on FOX News.
Posted by: Park McGraw | February 04, 2011 at 06:08 PM
Either Mr O'Reilly is simply playing to his base, or he actually believes his own distortions.
Either way it is obvious that he is an emotionally unhealthy person.
Science and faith can coexist Bill, but your denial of REALITY is nothing but madness.
Posted by: truth to power | February 04, 2011 at 06:08 PM
Does anyone really think O'Reilly is that stupid? On the internet, what he is doing is called trolling.
Posted by: dave | February 04, 2011 at 06:13 PM
This explains why they misspell Fox News.
Posted by: Native Angeleno | February 04, 2011 at 06:28 PM
The idiots are running Idiot America.
Posted by: Robert Mudd | February 04, 2011 at 06:36 PM
Well we have a racist among us.
Evidently its just too politically correct to deny that there really is anything fundamentally different within the human population of the Earth as a whole.
Which there isn't, which is backed up by a field of Biology called Genetics.
Posted by: Kazakhstanny Danny | February 04, 2011 at 06:44 PM
Please name one public figure who has not put his or her foot in his or her mouth.
Pinhead? - "We just have to pass the health care bill to see what's in it!" - Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.
We don't pay O'Reilly's salary and overhead. We can change cannnels....free press. We do pay Pelosi's salary and overhead.
Pure political spin and hypocricy.
Posted by: Tom | February 04, 2011 at 06:45 PM
Being wrong about moons and planets doesn't make him wrong about obama and the damage he has done to America !!
Posted by: Thinking | February 04, 2011 at 06:46 PM
is it a surprise that O'Reilly is a dufus? C'mon ...Geez...
Posted by: tw | February 04, 2011 at 06:51 PM
Notice how those on the right are not sticking up for O'Reilly, knowing he's not quite up to snuff intellectually. They're just upset he's being made fun of.
Posted by: DG3 | February 04, 2011 at 06:51 PM