"It is tremendously disheartening that we part ways due to completely unfounded claims," read his statement. "But that is the unfortunate reality many of us in the public eye must live with today."
Really? Can there be any less irony in the fact that even in departure, O'Reilly is all spin?
Bill O'Reilly had re-upped his multi-year contract with Fox to the tune of $25-million per. And, within a couple of months -- he's out of a job. If we ponder Nikoleyevich (Leo) Tolstoy's adage: "The two most powerful warriors are time and patience," we may discover a subtle preamble to the demise of the Fox News Channel's now-erstwhile "culture warrior." Here, it is symbolized by the reality of O'Reilly having signed that extension just in time to be too late. Too late to weather the retroactive backlash of his own past sexual misconduct that was rekindled in the wake of the timely demise of Ailes. And, just in time for O'Reilly to feel the consequences of the effect that Roger's misbehavior had on decisions made to bring Fox's workplace culture to at least 20th century standards.
Thus, other than the timing involved in getting fired for sexual harassment in April -- the month that trump (sic), for whatever reason, decided to declare "Sexual Assault Awareness Month -- signing that contract when he did seems the true underlying irony in the O'Reilly saga. Fact is, it's the 21st century and O'Reilly finally ran out of both time and mistakes. The wrong kind of mistakes. Mistakes involving women. At the worst possible time. And so, it became time for the smug, uncontrollably self-righteous "King of Cable" to be banished from the cable kingdom he helped create.
From Cable King to Village Idiot. All in one fell swoop.
Past is prologue?
From this perspective, it's always been the presumption that O'Reilly would have his share of "female problems" so to speak. But not necessarily of this nature. You figure he simply had to have learned his lesson after his bosses at Fox shelled out $9 million to Andrea Mackris to settle the sexual harassment complaint she filed against him back in 2004. Aside from whatever image he created of himself from that somewhat comedic kerfuffle, regarding interpersonal relationships in general, O'Reilly's essentially bullying persona seems the polar opposite of the "I'm a lover; not a fighter cliche'. His only attempt at marriage was a failure primarily, it is alleged, due to verbal and domestic abuse on his part.
Certainly, O'Reilly's classic Type A personality is a poor foundation on which to rest any hope for a stable relationship. It's probably safe to assume that for a man like Bill O'Reilly to succeed -- either at the "til death do us part" thing, or a semi-casual relationship -- he'd have to hook up with an exceedingly submissive woman. He is, by today's standards, an acrimonious anachronism for the circa late-1950's alpha-male. His attitude toward women in general seems to reflect that of a controlling, crudely chauvinistic, wife-beater-under-a-tux-wearing kind of guy. A strutting, knowingly insecure, borderline cutout of the murderous "Paul Snider" character of the Bob Fosse film "Star 80 ."
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