My (TV) Fling With Bill O'Reilly

Screenshot of Bill O'Reilly on Fox News' "Talking Points."

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Bill O’Reilly recently broke up with me. We only saw each other twice, but I’d thought maybe we had a connection.

I guess not. The other day, I got an e-mail from my agent saying that the executive producer of The O’Reilly Factor expressed no interest in having me on the show again after my two appearances.

Bill and I met the usual way: I caught his eye (my agent told his producers that I was a television commentator and former public radio host with a playful, progressive personality and a big, perky set of opinions), and he wanted to meet me (his producers booked me on the show).

I invested way too soon, as I always do when I find out a guy might be into me. I hadn’t heard good things about Bill O’Reilly—public radio colleagues warned me that he was pompous, aggressive, Usain Bolt-like quick to label, and, in particular, homophobic. But, to be fair and balanced, I had never watched his show regularly. So I started to … which meant I was watching Fox News regularly. And I actually found O’Reilly to be the fairest of the Great American troika of O’Reilly, Glenn Beck, and Sean Hannity. Which is like saying that Moe was the most intellectual of the Three Stooges or that Randy Jones was the straightest Village Person.

I perused his book, A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity (popularly called Bold Fresh, like a Factor shibboleth). That way, when we became the Sam and Diane of Fox News, I’d be ready with references to his childhood that I could drop as bons mots: “So you’re calling me ‘Salie’ now, O’Reilly? What am I—a running back for your Marist College football team? What would Sister Mary Lurana think of that?” And we’d laugh and laugh.

I boned up on the No Spin Zone. I eagerly studied the way he interacted with “Kelly” (the smart and beautiful Megyn Kelly) and “Hoover” (President Hoover’s great-granddaughter, Margaret). I identified his lovable quirks: He talks about segments on his show in the third person—as if their very puissance renders them sentient, like “ ‘Talking Points’ believes that the President is overreaching …” Sigh. God, that Bill is super smart: By presenting his segments this way, they have a “this just in” feel, as if he’s a neutral reporter of information. He reports; I decide to swoon: I have a history of falling for men who talk about themselves in the third person.

Having set my DVR to record his show nightly, I knew that he had recurring segments bursting with jocularity and titles teeming with wordplay: There is Glenn Beck on “At Your Beck and Call.” Glenn uses disconnect as a noun a lot and plays with Barbie dolls to make his points! There’s “Miller Time” with Dennis Miller. Dennis gets eight minutes via satellite to do things like make gay jokes about Barney Frank! It was only a matter of time before The Factor featured a segment called—of course!—“Gotta Have Faith.” I will use gay Barbies to make trenchant arguments for marriage equality!

Clearly he was recognizing in me something that not every man sees—that I could be intellectually nimble. I wasn’t just a knee-jerk Northeastern elitist lib; I was, deep down, a Southern girl from public school who could play in a big philosophical sandbox. Bill and I, we wouldn’t sit it out. We’d dance.

I knew my friends would think we were an odd couple, but I had visions of people saying, “You know, I would never have seen you two together, but somehow it just works. You make him a little pro-choicy, and he brings out a whole teabagging side of you we’ve never seen before.”

Tragically, our families never got along during our too-brief fling. And by “families,” I mean the people who loved Bill hated me. And the people who love me don’t watch Fox News.

As on any first date, I was nervous the first time I appeared on the show. On most first dates, I find wine to be very helpful, but that was not offered in the Fox green room. What I was offered, however, was advice from Geraldo Rivera. He looked very dapper in a blazer with jeans—kind of like a Fox News sartorial mullet: business on top, party down below.

Geraldo: Are you a comedian?

Me: Um, I guess that’s one of the things I’ve been called. I try to be funny … but I also try to say things.