bill: "the o'reilly factor" is on. tonight: >> a good point guard, here is what she does. she knows exactly when to pass the ball so that the team can win. and that is what i'm doing. bill: what is the real reason behind sarah palin quitting as alaska's governor? >> we are fishermen we know that only dead fish go with the flow. we have the inside story. >> today i would like to update you on our budget crisis. we have no money. bill: as the nation's largest state implodz, will president obama learn from governor schwarzenegger's failure? we will answer that vital question. >> i was his backbone. someone to be there for him. bill: behind the curtain lies an astonishing michael jackson's

story. what he did with hundreds of millions of dollars. ♪ caution, you are about to enter the no spin zone. the factor begins right now. [captioning made possible by fox news channel] captioned by the national captioning institute --www.ncicap.org-- bill: hi, i'm bill o'reilly. thanks for watching us tonight. as you may know, i was off last week. i was in switzerland. i will tell you a bit about that later on. usually when i take off, a big story breaks and they drag me back. well, a big story did happen. the death of michael jackson but no way was i coming back for that. pgh is like many of you, i do not believe mr. jackson was a hero in any sense. and the media frenzy over his death is unwarranted to say the least. now, there are some interesting stories surrounding mr. jackson's demise, money and drugs being two of them and we will look into those this evening. there are far more important things to talk about and that leads me to the talking points memo. will president obama become the

new arnold schwarzenegger? the parallels are spooky. both men are charismatic and use their personalities to get elected. but for governor schwarzenegger in california it has been a disaster. his approval rating now stands at 33%. the state's bankrupt. can't pay its bills. it is issuing ious. when arnold took office in 2003, california was spending $71 billion. now it's spending 92 billion while running a 26 billion-dollar deficit. that is hard to believe. and it happened on the governor's watch. if president obama does not learn from this, the u.s.a. could go bankrupt as well. no question. obama administration does not seem to be learning. in fact, now talking of another massive federal stem also a package. the truths is there was a misreading of just how bad an economy we inherited. i'm not laying -- it's now our

responsibility. bill: but mr. biden and the president have to know the stats are grim. right now the feds are spending almost $2 trillion more than the government has taken in. if that continues, the american dollar will collapse. the national debt is now almost $11.5 trillion. and the feds get into managing health care, that number is going to explode. even nancy pelosi could figure this out. if president obama continues the massive spending, every american is going to suffer. and soon. but it looks to me like many democrats in congress don't care. just as the california legislature didn't care. the liberal philosophy is one of big spending. they believe government should provide for everybody. nice thought. only it's impossible. and by trying to create a nanny state, the economic system in america could very well implode. it's happened in california

under a republican governor. pray it doesn't happen to the entire country under president obama. and that is the memo. now for the top story tonight, we still do not know exactly why sarah palin has quit her job as governor of alaska. joining us now from los angeles is a man who is close to the palin administration john zeigler a radio talk show host. so if there is one thing, let's just start off with one thing. a tipping point. what was the tipping point that made the governor say enough? >> bill, first of all people need proper context. -- the reality is this decision has been in the works for a very license time when i screamed my film in alaska i started to get the sense that something big was going to happen. i asked governor palin on my radio show whether she ever thought about giving this all up, whether it was worth it. her answer was astonishing to me. you can find that answer web

site how obama got elected.com. what has transpired here because the media has not provided the proper context to just how difficult her job has become. how impossible it has been for her to do simple tasks, how many money it has cost the state of alaska. how much money it has cost her. how much it has put her family through unprecedented attacks. i would ask each of your viewers to think for themselves what do you if you were under those circumstance and if you cared about your state and cared about your family, wouldn't you step aside? bill: let's walk through this. governor palin has been smeared. the family has been attacked. >> yes. >> ok. i can identify because who maybe smeared here, john? i'm not putting myself up to that level as the governor. but i have been smeared every day for the past 13 years, every single day. i know what she is going through. i didn't walk away because i feel because i feel that what i do here is important. that it helps people that it's necessary and that it is part of of my job to take the garbage

and i'm well paid to take it. governor palin also is in a position to do a lot of good for the people of alaska who put their confidence in her and elected her for four years, not two and a half. so, to me, i would say why didn't she tough it out? >> great question, bill. let me take on your analogy. bill, you are still capable of doing your job and doing it very well. you are in control of your own destiny. you have control over the content of your show. she was not in control of her own destiny. it was costing the state a lot of money. you are making money for fox news channel. it was costing the state of alaska a lot of money. it was costing her a lot of money. and i would venture to guess that your family has not been under the attacks that governor palin's family has been under that have been unprecedented and been well-documented, including in my film. the reality is the situations are apples and oranges. this is not a cowardly decision. this is a courageous decision that was made, get this, this is going to be shocking to loot of

people, bill. it was made for the very reasons she said they were made for. because she cares more about the state and the family then her own short-term political self-interest. this is an act of courage. bill: you say that all the investigations, all the accusations that she had to defend with her own private attorneys and using state attorneys was rung up a tremendous bill. diverting her attention away from governance. i'm not going to challenge that. i think that that -- if that is the tipping point, it's absolutely valid. ok. now, the governor then comes into the private sector in a few weeks. and she is going to make millions and millions of dollars. as i said in my radio commentary today, just asacol lynn powell did. colin powell, what he did, resigning as secretary of state in the middle of a war, middle of a war, ok, then he goes out in the private sector and he makes tens of millions of dollars which is what exactly sarah palin is going to do.

is it more than that though, is it more than providing for her family and spreading the palin message around? is there more? >> look. i don't know if she is going to make millions of dollars or not. >> but she will, john. >> she deserves to make whatever she can. >> probably so, bill. that was not her motivation. can i prove this with a couple of things. this is not the first time she has done this, bill. most of the media doesn't understand and has not reported that she sets up her run for governor by resigning from the oil and gas commission in alaska because she could not do her job. this is her m.o. she puts the public good above her own short-term political interest. bill: we are buying the principled stance, john. i'm not arguing with you. i think my audience will gof give the governor any benefit of the doubt. that's the fair thing to do. what's next? does she have a vision other than going out on the lecture circuit? going out writing the book, which she is going to do and going out, perhaps, doing a tv gig? is there something else? >> die not believe that this was a setup for 2012.

in fact, i know it was not. she's to spread her message and do the right thing and fight for america. she will continue to do so. the fact that the pundits are against her show how right she really is. >> all right. john. we appreciate you coming on and it's a very, very fascinating story. next on the rundown, karl rove will have some thoughts on sarah palin and what you just heard. and also president obama and russia. later, the "culture warrior" is on the media hysteria over michael jackson. playing throughout )

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bill: joining us from washington fox news analyst karl rove. you just heard john zeigler and me discuss the rationale behind governor palin's resignation. i saw that you had a few comments to-to-various publications that said you didn't think this was a smart political move. >> yeah, i don't. first of all, let me say i'm a fan of sarah palin. i thought she added a lot to our ticket in 2008. i thought she was a very viable candidate for 2012 before last friday. i'm trying to figure it out. like you, i'm perplexed. you put your finger on it. what is her next step? is it go-to-go out on the lecture tour? write a book? make speeches. pay off legal bills?

spend time with her family or is it to provide what she said was leadership for effective change in america? if it's the latter that is to say holding up the possibility of running for president, this is not a smart tactical move to take. it's unclear what her next steps in that regard would be. all these kind of things that she wanted to get away from. the press peering into her life. the ugly thing said about her family. those are not going to go await a minute the ethics investigations might go away. let me just tell you, if you are president of the united states. if you think the ethics violations being leveled against the governor's office in alaska are big time. wait until you get to the oval office and the kind of pressure that comes to bear there. bill: let me play devil's advocate with you. i'm pretty media savvy. i think you know that i'm going to manage sarah palin's campaign right now for presidency in 2012. but you have already done what i am going to hypothetically do now. so you can punch holes in what i say. so sarah palin takes herself out of the day-to-day in alaska saying, look, i can't really

govern here anymore. i'm too distracted. i have too many people after me. i'm spending too much money defending myself. i can't do the people's business so i'm going to turn it over to somebody who can do it better than i can. some people will believe that some people won't. then she signs up immediately with the washington speakers group or harry walker agency, that's my agency, and she gets 100,000 up for lectures and they immediately book her for 125 blek temperatures, $2.5 million, ok? >> she has already got her book. she goes around the country doing lectures and in the meantime does pro-bone know stuff for candidates. getting goodwill for the republican party. anybody who needs a star at their event, fundraiser, sarah palin shows up. she gets the goodwill. she spreads the word in lectures, gets the goodwill. builds up a war chest so she doesn't have to worry about money in the future and is still in the media the media she will

still be in when she has something to say. she will get tons more visibility than governor of alaska. she will build up personal finance and build up goodwill within the republican party and then she has got plenty of time to announce if she wants to run for president or not. where am i going wrong? >> you are right that she can go around creating chips by campaign for republican candidates. she can do that as governor. what she loses is control of her time. she does get the advantage of going out and being able to make a bunch of money paid speeches. probably limited under ethics laws doing that as governor. she could do the rest of that as governor and have the most important thing that a candidate at this point needs which is time to put together their own act, declare -- describe their own vision, educate themselves about the issues and get ready for a tough contest ahead. bill: she is not doing anything else. she doesn't have a full-time job. >> if you are governor of the state of alaska can you say look, i would love to come to your fund raising event but i

can't because i'm governor. now that excuse is gone. now suddenly it gets more difficult to say no, i can't come to your event. she will be under a lot more pressure to do a lot more free events on behalf of candidates and party organizations and she doesn't have the convenient excuse of saying you know what? i'm governor. she also loses the advantage of a lower profile. right now you don't want to have the highest profile in the world. we run through the new and fresh and exciting and it gets boring. what she needs to do is spend the time underneath the radar to build up herself, to build to educate herself about the issues. to develop a set of contacts that can help guide her through presidential campaign both politically and, more importantly from, a vision perspective. and she is now got everything coming at her. she thinks she has been under a lot of pressure. wait until she starts getting flood of invitations and she no longer has the ability to say i'm governor and i have a day job to do. you put your finger on another thing at the beginning of this. how does she answer the question of, look, i say this as a fan. i'm terribly disappointed in

this because i think it hurts her as a viable choice in 2012. it may make her more viable in 2016. how does she answer the question of jeez, it was too tough for me to be governor of alaska. i'm tough enough to be president of the united states. that's an awful difficult question to answer at this point point. bill: let's go to russia and barack obama is over there with the kremlin people. no friends of ours. is this appear important trip or a p.r. trip? >> well, it's an important but i'm afraid it's squandered opportunity. we have two young presidents. the president medvedev of russia and obama of the united states who rather than looking towards the challenges of the 21st century, iran, north korea, terrorism, are looking to the old threats of the 20th century, ie the number of u.s. nuclear weapons. these were dramatically reduced in the 90's. they were dramatically reduced in 2001. it's a number one priority of russia because they want to be able to safe we got something from the united states and incidentally we don't want to be talking about these other issues with the united states.

and barack obama went there. gave them what they wanted. it's unclear what is he going to get in return. we did get over fly rights over russia which saves us about $133 million it makes the resupply efforts in afghanistan easier. but that's a big tradeoff to give them this big psychological advantage and we get a small thing. bill: thanks very much. as always, we appreciate it directly ahead. yawn and mary katharine on whether president obama will bankrupt the united states of america. a factor investigation. you will not believe how much money michael jackson spent on himself. those reports after these messages.

bill: impact segment tonight. it is likely president obama will spend america into bankruptcy that will impact every one of us as the american dollar will lose value. that means your savings, my savings, and all of our earnings will be worth far less than they are right now. now, to be fair, this is speculative. and joining us now from washington to weigh in on this topic and sarah palin are fox news analyst juan williams and mary katharine ham. let's get to sarah palin first because we just heard karl rove on it, mary katharine. do you agree with rove or do you

agree with zeigler in i mean, who is right on this. >> i'm more with rove than anyone else, i think. it's a bizarre move politically, certainly, i think we should take her at her words. it seems to me if there were a scandal big enough to cause her resignation it would have been sniffed out by now because frankly the folks at the huffington post and people on the left would have been excited to have broken. this it seems like it would have come out. moving forward i am confused if she wants to come back a couple cycles from now she may be able to pull that off. being governor of alaska was her big political triumph. it was her record. i think -- i don't discount that at all. but moving forward, to have stepped down from that is going to be a huge obstacle for her to overcome. bill: what do you say, juan. >> you know what? sarah palin was the most popular republican right now going towards 2012. 45% of republicans would pick her to be the party's nominee, bill. for her to sudden lynn quit, that's out of line with the republican brand, which is supposed to be steady, reliable,

people you can count on in a crunch. you don't quit. so why would she quit in the talk around washington is it must be the money. she says she has half a million dollars in debt as a result of all these legal investigations. so then we go back to what you were saying earlier. maybe it's about getting out on the speaking circuit. maybe it's about a tv show. if that's the case, she really has played into the hands of her critics because as karl rove was saying, as you were saying, despite john zeigler yelling at you and yelling at the audience, freedom going to say is she a twit? where is the substance to sarah palin? where is the idea that drives sarah palin? bill: go ahead, mary katharine. >> i certain live don't think she is a twit from. my perspective i can understand the battering which she has taken which has been extremely unfair. just look at the speculation last couple of days on blogs in the mainstream media it's been bitter for her. bill: huffington post say she was pregnant or some crazy thing. >> some say she was pregnant.

another righter wrote she was going to run in 2012 on the platform of mental retardation. bill: the huffington post took that counsel but it was a staff member who did it. we have our internet cop on it. >> good. bill: bottom line on this thing is that sarah palin has a right as an american to live her life exactly how she wants to live it. >> those voters did vote her in, too. bill: they did. they can make a determination whether she is doing the best thing for the state. she may be. she may be unable to govern the way she wants to. i don't have any beef with this at all. none. i believe if i were managing sarah palin, i could bring her back to be a legitimate contender. i think karl rove could do it ten times better than i could. >> i don't know about that, bill bill. remember when john mccain put her on the ticket. he thought she was going to help appeal to suburban women and win over the people disaffected by hillary clinton's defeat by

barack obama. those women looked to her as in some way as role model and the idea that she quit and played into all the negative -- bill: six months from now. bill: she has taken another road. >> she is popular. bill: you are a democrat and have you been a liberal in the past. i think you have mod der rafted since you saw what happened to you personally when you went against liberal doctrine. but i think this is the big story coming that this country could well go into a california type bankruptcy if the barack obama administration doesn't stop and stop sign. am i wrong -- stop soon. >> you are right. the first indication is hard and fast. the first is that the folks in terms the polls are saying right enough to when they have problems with the obama administration it's about spending. it's about the size of the deficit. it's about the idea of increasing the deficit and putting added burden on future

generations. even more so that people are concerned about the very real possibility that will result in tax increases or inflation. bill: if if they start mary katharine with another giant stimulus government package, i think that the obama administration is going to hurt itself dramatically. i don't think people are going for that. >> i think you are right. people i talk to are confused about which trillion-dollar package we are on now. they are getting fed up and you see it in the poll numbers. another parallel with california interestingly a couple years ago they global warming packet and now they are raising fees and ho will push those fees on consumers and thereby taking down the economy further. the only reason they are having to deal with this at all and issue ious and not pretending they have fake money. voters said you are not going to do this on our backs. they objected research da that

would have done that obama will have to face the same some day. bill: if they get into managed health care the federal government gets into it, i think it's all over. i feel sorry for people who don't have health insurance, i do. i think it's over. i don't think they can afford it i don't think they know what they are doing. go ahead, juan, i will give you the last word. >> they don't know how much it's going to cost. they don't know how they are going to pay for it of course they come up against hypocrisy charge the president obama said during the campaign he wasn't going to raise taxes on people who make less than 250. every scenario now has him doing just that there is no way to do it and no way to be sure who gets covered. what's the benefit? bill: we will see. juan and mary katharine thanks very much as always we have a brand new bill o'reilly.com poll for you. do you think sarah palin was smart? there is the key word, smart to resign? yes or no. do you think sarah palin was smart to resign? bill o'reilly.com. plenty more ahead as the factor moves athis evening. you will not believe how much

michael jackson spent on himself. what does that say about him and the media glorifying him. later, a sad day for america. al franken becomes a u.s. se

bill: estimate dollars that michael jackson spent half a billion dollars on himself before his untimely death. think about that. half a billion dollars.

jackson went on wild shopping sprees spent as much as $30 million a year on clothes, travel and toys. his ranch out in santa barbara cost nearly $20 million and upkeep every year millions more. by the late 1 0s jackson's career diminished and he began taking out loans to support his lavish lifestyle ending up more than $400 million in debt according to some estimates. joining us from los angeles alexis martin kneelly a family law attorney and from long island reisner a lawyer to negotiated some contracts for michael jackson. let's begin with you, what does spending half a billion dollars on yourself say about a person. >> no physical control. no one really watching him. yet, people who used him. yet people that awiewz dollars him. people who took money from him. he did spend a lot of money allegedly on drugs. he spent a lot of money on neverland. he was a youngster. he himself was a child and he spent a lot of money on toys.

neverland and furnishing it. bill: that's an interesting point so you say he was enocial enocially child's. go in and spend enormous amounts of money until we got into debt. he had a right to do whatever he wanted. there was nobody there who could say to him you can't do it. because he was an adult. basically nobody could have stopped him. >> if they did, he fired them. bill: all right. so nobody could have stopped him. >> that's right. now, courtroom -- counselor kneelly, there is a guy he has three children. he is not in control of himself in the sense that he is taking narcotics and i believe that you will see his death certificate will be an overdose of a

powerful sleeping possession. i believe that will happen. he has got the children. he is out of control in his lifestyle. legal problems aside, just in the way he lives from day to day, is he crazy. he has got the kids in burkas, he is running them around the world. he is dangling the baby over the balcony, doing all of this crazy stuff. in america there, is nobody that could stop him from doing that, right? >> no. this was a man who was in a tremendous amount of pain. he was crying out for help. and nobody was giving it to him. bill: he didn't want help. >> spending -- bill: if you criticized him, he fired you or wouldn't talk to you. >> absolutely. that's why he had no bottom. his bottom was death. it was the only way out for him. and what we have to look at now is who will be raising these kids so that they grow up differently so that they grow up with the values that he did not have. bill: his mother, the grandmother is going to raise them. they are north going to give it

to this gold digger woman. >> exactly. the same person who raised michael jackson is now going to raise his kids. what kind of values are they going to have? what have they already been taught and how is that going to be turned around? it is critically important here that we look at the welfare of these kids. and make sure that they don't make the same mistakes that their father made. bill: ok. now, mr. riseman, if you have a situation that that's out of control with three dependents, all right? the little children, and you have a situation as crazy nobody can step in do anything, correct? >> that's correct. he was the father. he was charged. he had custody. he could do whatever he want with those children. bill: all right. then. over the past six days, have you seen the media in the united states and all over the world glorify michael jackson. how do you, sir, react to that

glorification? >> well, i think he was a great artist. bill: that doesn't matter. they are glorifying the man, not his dance steps. >> they are glorifying him as an artist. they are glorifying him as a person. they are saying he contributed to music. he contribute to the african-american experience in america. he was a living and will be a living legend. bill: you are buying that? >> i am. bill: you? then he insem nates the carrier of the mother of the children with white people's sperm and some kind of racial component here to black people? >> i'm not so sure about that. bill: all you have got to do is look at the kids, counselor, come on. >> i have looked at the kids and they look pretty good. bill: they look fine but they are white kids. so the racial component escapes me here. all right. i'm going to give you the last word, ms. kneelly. when you watch this coverage, glorifying michael jackson as a

person for the last week, what do you think? >> i think that we have to realize is he not a role model, that he needs to be held up as an example of exactly what we need to not do to our kids in this country and say do not be like mikial jackson. do not have his values. you are more than that if you are in pain, you need to get help, not just have more money thrown at you. not be given anything you want. bill: i think that's an excellent point. it's a cautionary tale it's not played that way in the media. doesn't give a whit about michael jackson it just wants to make money. it always comes back to money. counselors, thanks very much. culture warriors on the media and michael jackson. is there something dishonest about the presentation? a media gets fed one michael jackson zealot and it

ok. oomph. i'm a mommy. i love kids! i'm responsible, loving, nurturing. oooph. momma's coming, baby! [panting, grunts] ah! ah! ahhhh! all: mamma! [baby dinosaurs laugh] sid: [laughs] ha ha, no, stop, stop.

bill: thanks for staying with us. i'm bill o'reilly. in the culture warrior segment tonight, while watching the michael jackson coverage on cnn and the bbc because the swiss have not yet engaged fox news i got frustrated quickly. many think mr. jackson was a hero because he could sing and dance. to be fair, you have h. to cover a story like this because he was one of the most successful entertainers in history to spin it into glorification is

dishonest. culture warriors juliet huddy in for margaret hoover and "fox & friends" co-host gretchen carlson. carlson, have you got to deal with this every morning. are you getting tired dealing with this stuff. >> even extra early the morning after he died. i'm personally very tired of this story. our viewers our core viewers are tired of this story, however, i will tell you that the very next morning after his death, the minute we tried to do any other kind avenues segment, which i was a proponent of, our ratings went down. bill: drive by people who don't watch cable news but want this story and there are a lot of them. gretchen: here is the issue. i feel it's a disservice to the american public to cover this story 24/7. we passed at least the house did cap and trade the day after michael jackson died. we are talking about reforming health care in this nation to change america like we have never seen before and the american public does not know that full story. bill: we can cover those stories next week or whatever. i understand and i said this the top of the program. i wasn't coming back from

switzerland, huddy, for michael jackson. ain't going to happen. >> heck no, o'reilly. bill: everybody knows whenever i go on vacation a big story is going to break. that always happens. this, and i also, absolutely think that our core is right. we are overplaying it but we are in a competitive industry. we have to compete and that's what you have to do in america. >> that's exactly right. bill: the other media. >> i disagree with that by the way. bill: you have to. the -- look, we pay you a lavish salary to get that salary you have to have eyeballs watching. that's the name of that game. i haven't seen this too much on fox. they are glorifying the man, are they not. >> they are glofing the man. bill: not the entertainer they are glorifying the man. >> they are glorifying the man. you expect that the vh 1's and mtv's to have the ode to mike cool jackson and things like that. they are not in the business of giving objective news coverage. that's fine would me. i get it when you have heavy hitters, i'm not just talking

about the -- bill: katie couric is there gibson is there for the memorial service. greta is there. >> yes. there was one knelt work that up until yesterday, sunday was planning on just doing a one hour special on tuesday night and all of a sufferedden they changed their minds and now they have sent their big wigs there. bill: who is this? >> this is nbc. changed their minds. bill: same position that fox is in. they have to compete with the other networks. >> why not take a stand and say this man has been -- he wasn'ted convicted neither he wasn't and neither was o.j. simpson. bill: you can't seed the audience like that. it ruins your whole month of ratings. people have to understand this like major league baseball or football. you can't lose three games in the season. >> we are all in the industry we know ratings are king. >> you can cover it in a different way. some people would say that cap and trade we should cover michael jackson that week and let that go by. i think that's an extremely important issue. >> cap and trade will make people fall over compared with michael jackson. bill: it's an important issue, carlson. there are a lot of important issues. nobody is going to sit there and

watch cap and trade. >> all all for a good mystery. if we have new information about what happened to michael jackson then by all, whatever, we should say fox news alert, we figured out what killed michael jackson. >> what about what was happening with iran and the post election protest. >> we covered that all over the place. >> interestingly that week the week that michael jackson died the pew research poll was saying they were watching the news coverage and they said the coverage of iran was about 19%. coverage of michael jackson was 1%. when you look at the day that mike k58 jackson died and the next day, friday. it was 60% michael jackson coverage and iran was 7%. bill: iranian story is pretty much over. now, i have got to get into a couple of things specifically. we talked briefly will about the racial component and in the pew study that you cited hudy. very good huddy has done her research and can be a cull purr warrior. black americans are much more engaged in watching this stuff than white americans. even though michael jackson has white children and he chose to

have white children and the face deal, i don't even want to get into. so what's that racial thing all about? >> he was the first african-american entertainer to cross that barrier. bill: to cross what barrier? >> to be liked by both whites and blacks. bill: that's not true motown did that. >> he was the first african-american in mtv. bill: motown did that 20 years before e. came on. he wasn't the first cross overartist. now he was the most successful buff the black community in america, sharpton is there, jackson is there. are rallying to this. i'm going what? there is no racial component to this story at all. bill. >> i understand that we are also not focusing on the pedophile accusations. bill: because we can't because he was acquitted. we can't to be fair. >> $20 million. bill: that's true. not guilty. >> little boys that were not his children. biffle bill only thing you can say with certainty is what he did with children was inappropriate. and it is wrong for an adult to

do what he did. you can say that. >> he is an entertainer and he is considered quirky, you know, which, you know, sort of alludes to being cute. it's -- he was a freak. let's be honest he was a freak. his face was falling off. bill: he was as you say a freak. what does it say about the u.s. media making him into a hero. gretchen: which is my point. >> why we are here gretchen carlson. this is why celebrities are not convicted of crimes. we feed the american public with this type of information, increasing their viability as a celebrity to this status that is above the rest of the american public. bill: i have got to run. but what you guys are saying if you are a talented actor, musician, athlete, whatever, if you can entertain, that overrides everything else that you do and you are then deatied by the u.s. media. >> in 2009 that's where we have come. >> well said. bill: thanks for being here. wild reality check on deck starring al franken and the

mother of jackson's children debbie rowe. 

i'm sorry. i can't hear you very well. announcer: does someone you know have trouble hearing on the phone? dad. dad, let me help you with that, okay? announcer: now, a free phone service shows captions of everything a caller says. i'd like to make an appointment to see the doctor. announcer: to learn more about captioned telephone, call 1-800-552-7724 or go to our website. i'll see you at 3:00! announcer: captioned telephone - enjoy the phone again! bill: reality check where no subject is safe from truth telling. check one, in a sad day for america al franken is now a u.s.

senator. the minnesota supreme court ruled he won the election by 300 votes. frankson a blatantly dishonest individual, a far left zealot is ho is not qualified to hold any office. a man who trafficked in hate on his failed air america program. if you want proof check out page 96 in my book culture warrior. with people like franken on the hill, this country industry in deep trouble. check 2. as mentioned i was in switzerland last week and i did not see any litter on the street. let me repeat, i drove hundreds of miles. there was no litter anywhere. switzerland is the cleanest country in the world. i went there to look at the swiss environmental approach. the place is stunning. there are 7.5 -- there are 1.5 million people living in switzerland. 22% foreign born but apparently they are all green. according to the environmental performance index. switzerland is number one in the

world and it shows. health care mandatory for the swiss but the government does not pay. and the worker, the company that he works for do. however, the poor receive subsidies from the government. can you choose your own doctor there. retirement is also funded by workers. not by the government. by law, retirement contributions are deducted from all paychecks. companies are required to pay into retirement accounts. if you want to become a swiss citizen they don't want you it takes 12 years or longer and you can be rejected without a reason. you sneak in there, they will boot you right out. income taxes top out at about 40%, just like about here. there are a number of other taxes like here. but very little poverty not like here. only 3% of swiss citizens are on welfare. the country works and our leaders should be studying it they should stay at the palace hotel. patterson of new york is a no spin guy.

don't believe me? listen to this. >> this low life michael jackson name face and picture is all over the newspapers, television, radio, that's all we hear about is michael jackson. let's knock out this psycho babble. this guy was a pervert, a child molesters, he was a pedophile and to be giving this much coverage to him day in and day out what does it say about us as a country. i think we're too politically correct. bill: check doesn't believe congressman king has been invited to michael jackson's service tomorrow. the mother of michael jackson's children debbie rowe is not going either. she says she would like them back. >> don't. >> are you ready to fight for chure children. >> do not touch me. >> nobody touched you here. >> you just did. don't. >> are you fighting to children. >> are you ready to get your butt kicked? don't touch me. bill: nice. even reporting on jackson's death has its peril.

>> the street where locals and tourists alike gather to listen to music. people like this, they listen to this stuff all the time, for example. see this guy, you like michael jackson too, don't you? see this guy is a little out of control right now but you can't blame him for that tell you a little bit more about michael jackson. >> michael jackson. so, basically the deal is. >> ok, apparently unruly fan out there. >> yeah. >> involving getting involved in -- never want to do that with steve michael. >> sometimes it happens when people have a little too much to drink. bill: can't say i would not have done the same thing and i have. check 6, last week president obama spoke to a gay group at the white house. >> real transformative change never begins in washington. [duck] >> whose duck back there. >> it's a duck. >> there is a duck quacking in there somewhere. [ laughter ]

where do you guys get these ring tones by the way? i'm just curious. bill: so if it sounds like a duck, well, you get the idea. check 7, police in warren, ohio questioning a woman named amber finney about a shooting. then all of a sudden something emerged from her cleave vaged she explained the squirrel named stripe was injured and she was helping with the healing. perfectly understandable, right? we often see squirrels in cleavage do we not? she was not detained. stripe has been released into the wild from whence it came. that is reality check. pinheads and patriots on deck tonight starring model of decorum or something.

bill: time for "pinheads and patriots." when you watch the factor and see the tv icon segments and the best of segments they are

produced by rob mob acko. this morning his wife lara gave birth to twin boys. that makes four monaco boys on the earth and makes lara monaco a super patriot. and on the pinhead front, bar rafaely wanted to bring attention to an exhibit in her homeland by doing this. we're not quite sure what. but it get -- did get attention, as evidenced by our mention is it on the highest rated cable news show in the world. at least a squirrel didn't pop out. making progress the and here is one of the greatest deals of all time. see this great american patriot polo shirt? you see it? excellent. and it's great quality. well, if you buy one you get

this very nifty american patriot tote bag free. come on, how good is this? check is -- it out online. the letters. bill: look, injecting politics into these matters is dumb. we covered sanford the same way as edwards. we were fair and accurate. bill: all i can tell you is that from the holy city of qum, the mullahs say it is fixed. how's that in bill: well, that is using your time constructively, dave. we have to cover the story, as i said, because there is

interest in it but you were start -- smart to draw the line. bill: and you will be successful, sarah. your experience in anbar assures that. bill: it's called vacation here, jan, going on holiday in australia. remember, man does not plive -- live by bloviating alone. bill: he's just jealous, karen. tell him to wise up. bill: well, i appreciate that, and now everybody can get in on the deal. we will send close to $1

million to help kids, wounded military people, and the poor this year alone because of all the stuff you guys guy on billoreilly.com. email us with pithy comments. name and town, name and town, name and town if you wish to opine. please, when writing to us, the word of the day is do not be rambunctious. is that spelled right? it is. i wrote it so i think it is spelled correctly. but we don't want you to be that when writing to us. that's it for us today. we hope to see you again next time and remember the spin stops right here because we're definite willing looking out for you.

gretchen: good morning, everyone. it's tuesday, july 7, 2009. thank you for sharing your time today. we begin with a fox news alert. because barack obama just wrapping up a speech in moscow. did he send a very strong message. >> to begin with let me be clear, america wants a strong, peaceful, and prosperous russia. this belief is rooted in our respect for the russian people and a shared history between our nations that goes beyond competition. gretchen: we are live in moscow with more on what the president had to say. eric? acre acre new video just released of michael jackson's. we are live in l.a. in just two minutes. ♪ brian: ok. i have never saw that before. remember this video of a cop knocking a cyclist off his bike. those black and blue could say now make the biker a whole lot of green and buy him