Bill O'Reilly lies.

Pro has the burden of proof in this debate. A lie is a false statement deliberately presented as true. Pro must prove that O'Reilly was not merely mistaken, but knew what he was saying was false at the time he said it and nonetheless pretended it was true. The conventional ways of proving a lie are the testimony of confident who was in on it, the confession of the perpetrator, or the presentation of physical evidence that contradicts the statement. Physical evidence must go beyond showing the statement to be false, but must contradict an innocent explanation. Bill Clinton's famous "I did not have sex with that woman." was contradicted by DNA on a dress. In this debate, Pro has offered no evidence in any of these categories of proof. O'Reilly has produced 6000 hours of commentary, most of it off-the-cuff, and all subject to the fine-toothed examination of critics. All humans are subject to errors: accepting confirming evidence as decisive despite other disconfirming evidence, believing third party sources that ultimately prove unreliable, and failing to recall things accurately. There are also outright flubs: I gave the example of presidential candidate Obama saying he had visited 48 states and had only six more to go. Obama was neither stupid nor lying, he simply flubbed. I challenged Pro to give us a standard as to how often it would be reasonable for O'Reilly, or anyone else, in 6000 hours to recite false information believed true, fail to recollect what happened, recall sources incorrectly, give unsustainable opinions, or flat-out flub. Would a dozen flubs or other errors in 6000 hours of commentary be reasonable or unreasonable? Pro declined to provide any estimate of what might be a reasonable. She insists that O'Reilly's errors must be lies, based upon the argument that "he must have known." Students often provide the wrong answers to exam questions. Are those errors lies or mistakes? If we could show that the student was in class when the subject was covered, that the answer given by testers was provably correct, that the student once knew the correct answer, or that other students got the right answer, would that prove the student lied? It would not. The accusation that the student lied is absurd, despite evidence that the student "must have known," because other explanations are more plausible than supposing that the student would want to do himself apparent harm by having a lower test score. Alternative explanations for O'Reilly's errors are more plausible than his having lied. Yet is difficult prove the student --or O'Reilly-- didn't lie. Complicating the situation, while the answers to most exam questions are cut-and-dried, political commentary is often less clear. See (2) below for an example highly subject to viewpont. 1. The boycott of France was a direct result of the duplicitous behavior of France in which the French promised Colin Powell support in the UN, then voted for Saddam's side. The French travel industry sad they expected $500 million in losses as a result, and exports of French wine actually dropped by about $400 million. Pro claims that O'Reilly must have known that the boycott was a failure and therefor must have lied when he proclaimed it a success. Pro argues that the boycott was clearly a failure because there was no political impact. However, the boycott was called off after only six months because of the election of much-more-conservative Sarcozy as president of France. That was a major political event. No doubt the French electorate did not crumble under the economic pressure of the boycott, but it is likely that the attention brought to the issue of duplicitous dealing helped oust the previous government. It was reasonable for O'Reilly to suppose that the boycott was effective. It is not persuasive to suppose that because yearly sales of oil services outweighed the losses and threats of losses in wine and travel in six months that O'Reilly would think the boycott failed. O'Reilly believed the boycott was effective, and he might have pointed to the USA Today article that I cited Instead, he recalled the source incorrectly under pressure. There is no evidence it was a lie, any more than Obama's reference to 54 states proved Obama lied. In either case, a lie would be pointless. 2. Did a majority of people support the Iraq war in 2008? According to Pro's source, 40% did not want a timetable for withdrawal, but only 17% wanted immediate withdrawal. The rest either wanted some sort of time table, or felt that the U.S. would be stuck there indefinitely. I suppose that O'Reillly looked at that data and concluded there was only 17% opposition to the War. Pro claims that the poll shows 60% opposition and that O'Reilly must have interpreted it that way, and therefore lied in saying he thought there was popular support. Pro interpreted "wants a timetable" as "opposed to the war" while O'Reilly believed it meant "supports continuation." 3. Pro argues that it is inconceivable that O'Reilly made a mistake about CNN's reporting, so he must have lied. No one lies about things that are easily verified, and CNN's reporting was easily verified. I think O'Reilly is obsessed with prime time reporting, because O'Relly's show competes in prime time. O'Reilly incorrectly said that the story wasn't covered in general, but his opinion was probably incorrectly shaped by the relative paucity of prime time coverage.Whatever the reason, it isn't plausible that O'Reilly lied, because if O'Reilly knew of the coverage he would know a lie would be exposed. 4. It's true that O'Reilly said the words "shut up" more often than claimed. I explained that logically in terms of O'Reilly distinguishing cases of "shut up" meaning "pause" versus "get out." Pro claims that it is my job to prove that my explanation is true. Pro believes that the presumption should be that O'Reilly is lying. I think that the presumption should never be in favor of malice. Defendants must be proved guilty; they ought not be assumed guilty and required to prove innocence. That is the case broadly. There are many political commentators with whom I disagree and who make tons of mistakes, but I don't accuse them of lying. It is unjustified. 5. O'Reilly offered an opinion on a kidnapping victim. No one believed O'Reilly was claiming a fact; he acknowledged and attacked the opinions offered by others. Having a wrong opinion is a lie. I don't know whether or not O'Reilly ever acknowledged his error, but if he didn't that is not proof that he lied when he said he would. He was wrong, but it is possible he never thought he was as far off as he was. 6. Pro cites evidence that O'Reilly was wrong, but that is not evidence that he lied. An exam paper is physical evidence that a student marked the wrong answer to a question, but it isn't evidence that the student deliberately picked the wrong answer. O'Reilly, and virtually everyone else, speaks in a context that they think is clear. A failure to be clear is an error, not a lie. 7. -13. Pro has abandoned all of these contentions. Debates have limits on time or space, and both sides have the same problem of crafting responses within the space. Pro made far too many unsustainable accusations. 14. Pro accuses O'Reilly of being inconsistent in what he thinks are reasonable grounds for a boycott. I think it is true that he was inconsistent. O'Reilly's explanation was that he only proclaimed that he would personally boycott Pepsi and that he didn't try to organize others to join in. He thought that was a good distinction. O'Reilly was rationalizing, I think poorly, but not lying. As noted, commentators have big egos that facilitate rationalization. No one has accused O'Reilly of excess humility. Pro, I think, hopes readers will hate O'Reilly enough to find him guilty of lying even though there is no evidence of his intent. That's not logical. The resolution is negated.