SEPTEMBER 15, 14:56 ET
Fox's O'Reilly in Fight With Right
By DAVID BAUDER
AP Television Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — There's nothing unusual about pugnacious talk show host Bill O'Reilly being in a fight. The real surprise this time is who he's fighting.
In the past two weeks, O'Reilly has come under attack from the right, from the same ideologues who helped make the Fox News Channel personality one of the most popular figures on cable television.
Earlier this month on ``The O'Reilly Factor,'' he had a riveting confrontation with Bible-toting Stephen Bennett, a Connecticut minister who speaks out against the adoption of children by gays and lesbians.
After O'Reilly called Bennett a ``religious fanatic,'' two conservative groups, Concerned Women for America and the American Family Association, urged its members to protest.
``I got 100 e-mails telling me I'm going to hell,'' O'Reilly said. ``That's a little personal.''
Last week, The Wall Street Journal — normally friendly ``Factor'' territory — published a column by its chief editorial writer, William McGurn, who called O'Reilly ``unhinged'' for his behavior toward the writer as a guest. His headline: ``The Blowhard Zone.''
So many battles, so little time. It's not as if he's ignoring other ends of the spectrum, either. The rapper Ludacris and his fans are mad because an O'Reilly segment led Pepsi to drop the musician as a spokesman. O'Reilly's fight with Hollywood personalities over disbursement of Sept. 11 charity funds continues.
Whether calculated or not, the dispute with conservative groups may be as shrewd as a politician who adroitly positions himself in the center just before an election.
When Bennett came on the show, he tried to appeal to O'Reilly's Irish Catholicism by reading Bible quotations against homosexuals.
O'Reilly would have none of it. He couldn't understand why Bennett would object to a troubled child in foster care for six years being adopted by a loving gay couple. Bennett couldn't understand why O'Reilly was advocating for gay rights.
The Concerned Women for America seemed hurt, as if slapped across the face by a brother. Writing to O'Reilly to protest, the organization's president slipped in a proverb: ``Faithful are the wounds of a friend.''
``If you do something wrong, if your slip is showing, your family is the one that rushes to your side and helps you and corrects you, because they love you,'' said CWA president Sandy Rios. ``He embarrassed himself and, as a friend of his show, I was embarrassed.''
Similarly, McGurn — who appeared on a segment about two women kidnapped to Saudi Arabia — seemed betrayed.
``I did not come at this as an O'Reilly hater,'' he wrote. ``I regard Fox News as a national treasure, and even wrote a column for this paper a few years back about Mr. O'Reilly at a time when he was whining that The New York Times would not even mention his name.''
Rios reacted just like an ideological opposite who went on the show and couldn't get a word in edgewise.
``He was completely twisting the facts,'' she said. ``He manipulated the entire discussion. Even if he disagrees with Stephen, he should have at least let Stephen have his say. I would never support anybody, including Bill, who bullies their guests.''
Not surprisingly, O'Reilly sees things differently.
``We've always said, `don't let your ideology hold you captive,''' he said. ``Now if they feel betrayed because I make a point that it's better to have a child with a stable home, even if it's run by homosexuals, than to be in the unbelievably chaotic atmosphere of foster care, if they feel that's a betrayal, then that's on them. We gave them more than enough time to come on the program and explain their point of view.''
People who pigeonhole O'Reilly as a conservative wouldn't have expected the exchange. O'Reilly is conservative on some issues, but he supports gun control, opposes the death penalty and is an environmentalist at heart. He fashions himself a populist.
O'Reilly says now what has always been hard for people at Fox News to admit: that he once had a hard-core, right-wing audience.
``I think our audience has changed,'' he said. ``The e-mail reflects a very wide cross-section of America watches the `Factor.'''
The ratings do, too. With so many people watching — O'Reilly routinely has a bigger audience than cable competitors Connie Chung and Phil Donahue combined — it's not just people cheering him. He has viewers who like to yell back at the television, too.
And if he wants that audience to keep growing, he'd be wise not to be too predictable.
O'Reilly recently gave an interview to the gay newspaper, The Advocate, and spoke to a convention of gay and lesbian journalists.
They're by no means complete allies; the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Discrimination disagrees with O'Reilly's opinion that homosexuals should keep their sexual preference to themselves. But GLAAD appreciates that O'Reilly has backed them on a key issue, and knows he reaches a constituency unlikely to listen to gay activists.
Cathy Renna, GLAAD's spokeswoman, watches O'Reilly all the time. It's her job. And she knows what it feels like to be pre-judged.
``I think it's been really interesting to see him, now that he's come out more publicly and strongly in support of anti-discrimination,'' Renna said. ``On some level, it is kind of a surprise. I'm not surprised by the reaction.''
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