Fresh Loaf

The AJC’s Cynthia Tucker clearly struck a nerve on Wednesday when she used her column to demonstrate how Fox News Senior Falafel Correspondent Bill O’Reilly is a ginormous phony.

After calling her a “nut” a couple days ago, O’Reilly sent a camera-wielding goon squad to Atlanta this morning to ambush the Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist while she was carrying her groceries.

According to Tucker’s colleague, AJC columnist Jay Bookman, the goon squad yelled loaded questions at Tucker that blatantly misrepresented the points she made in her recent column, which noted O’Reilly’s selective outrage on the subject of teen pregnancy.

O’Reilly publicly condemned Lynne Spears after her 16-year-old daughter Jamie Lynn became pregnant. Yet, O’Reilly has been supportive of Republican V.P. candidate Gov. Sarah Palin, whose 17-year-old daughter Bristol is pregnant.

One can only guess at O’Reilly’s motives for sending a crew to ambush Tucker at her home. It sounds to me like the self-pitying talk show host was hoping to gather unflattering footage of Tucker to air on his show.

In other words, O’Reilly lost the factual argument, so he’s lashing out like a whiny little bitch.

If ever a grown man needed to be put in time-out, it’s Bill O’Reilly.

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Watch out, ladies. Those Tech kids sure are wacky.

Michael McCarty, a 20-year-old Georgia Tech student, met his dream girl, a fellow college student, online 5 years ago.

So in preparation for her upcoming visit — when the two will meet face-to-face for the first time — Michael has turned to the Internet for help with something he hasn’t experienced — kissing.

McCarty, a finance major, placed an ad on Craigslist asking for “a girl to please teach me to kiss.” He says in the ad that his online girlfriend “tells me it’s a big turn-off if a guy doesn’t know how to kiss, and she even dumped her last boyfriend because of this.”

…

“I guess I’ve been on the computer too much playing video games and not going out and meeting people as much as I’d like to.”

Here’s his ad. Go Dawgs.

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Conventional wisdom dictates one loves or loathes Fox News because of the network’s politics.

I think what differentiates Fox from CNN or ABC, however, isn’t that it’s the place where Republicans and not-liberals go for TV news they like.

I think the secret is sensationalism.

All TV news sensationalizes. Fox sensationalizes with an intensity and shamelessness that other news outlets do not. Every moment of Fox News is calculated to get people worked up.

Example:

Yesterday afternoon in Phoenix, a toddler died after apparently being left in a hot car by his mom while she worked as a server at Hooters.

National news outlets are all over the story — because it’s tragic, and because the mother’s employment at Hooters provides an opportunity for networks to show scantily clad women, and for armchair phony moralists to make snide comments about “Hooters girls.”

ABCNews.com’s headline for the story is Forgotten Toddler Dies Inside Hot Car.

The Arizona Republic’s website headlines the sad death 17-Month Old Found Dead In Car.

FOXNews.com puts all of the story’s sensationalistic appeal right in the headline:

Toddler Dies After Hooters Mom Forgets Child in Hot Car.

The image they chose for the story is of 16 women in Hooters outfits at a convention in Las Vegas.

Fox looks at a dead child and a grieving family and sees tits and ass.

Yet it’s the preferred network of self-proclaimed family-values, traditional conservatives.

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