Posted on 01/27/2016 3:21:29 PM PST by WhiskeyX
It was funny to watch Bill miss the point time after time. Trump kept mentioning that he was not going to allow Fox to profit financially from his participation in the debate. Bill kept ignoring that point and, instead, emphasizing the supposed need for the American people to hear (again) what Trump had to say. I suspect that Bill was trying to score points with Roger Ailes by bringing Trump back to the debate and thereby avoiding the financial loss associated with his absence. Publicly forcing Fox to pay a financial penalty for disrespecting Trump is a rational strategy, much like punching a bully in the nose in order to deter him and dissuade others from similar behavior. Trump’s willingness to stand up to one of the most powerful news organizations in the country also speaks well for his temperament to be president.
Why take a good movie scene and ruin it?
Trump was being nice about it, but I suspect the way in which O’Reilly reneged on his promise or representation to not ask Trump to return to the debate just lowered Trump’s esteem for Bill O’Reilly and their friendship. Once again a journalist and his news organization could not be trusted to keep the letter or spirit of their promises or representations.
Since when is a politician allowed to ask an interviewer not to ask him questions? If Obama did this, you’d be railing him as an imperial president.
“Trump was being nice about it, but....”
Good point. The most unwavering support I have seen for Trump on cable news has been from NEWSMAX TV, where Steve Malzberg, J.D. Hayworth, and Dennis Michael Lynch all seem to understand the rationale for Trump’s decision to boycott the FNC debate.
“Since when is a politician allowed to ask an interviewer not to ask him questions? If Obama did this, you’d be railing him as an imperial president.”
Not in these circumstances. FNC entered into contractual agreements in order to secure the rights to televise the Republican debates. Included in the contracts were terms that described who could be the moderators and provided the moderators would be required to confine their questions and comments to the ordinary and non-biased subjects of such debates. The contracts forbid using the debates as an opportunity for the moderators to editorialize or adopt openly partisan and hostile questions that are biased in favor of one or another political point of view. FNC went far beyond the standard of non-biased and partisan moderation when Megyn Kelly and the others neglected topics unfavorable to the Obama Administration and embarked upon openly hostile strawman arguments instead of debate. This is th same reason why the RNC was justified in canceling any further CNBC debates, because of the way in which CNBC breached its contract with the RNC. Trump has warned for months that FNC must not breach its contract again in the way it did in August 2015, Megyn Kelly again being responsible only in part. There were signs that FNC intended to ambush Trump with another breach of its contract, so Trump followed through with his longstanding warnings to comply with the contract or he would withdraw if and when the contract was being breached by FNC. FNC breached the contract, and Trump withdrew from the now corrupted debate.
That brings us up to date with this Bill O’Reilly interview. This interview was scheduled before FNC made it clear they were in the act of breaching the contract agreement for the debate. When the agreement was made, this breach of contract by FNC had not yet occurred, and Trump was still planning to participate in the debate. Accordingly, the topic of Trump attending the debate was not included in the agreement to appear on the Bill O’Reilly show. After the breach of contract by FNC, Trump was not obligated to appear on the Bill O’Reilly show at all, much less obligated to talk about the dispute over the breach of contract by FNC. Accordingly, Trump had every right to expect and respect such a contractual and legal matter to be excluded as a topic in an interview regarding political topics. Bill O’Reilly acknowledged this even as he attempted to persuade Trump to overlook the FNC breach of contract and thereby benefit Rupert Murdoch, the ultimate owner of FNC. Trump said he was there to answer the normal political debate questions, but not the commercial contract with FNC.
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