With Bill O’Reilly’s departure, there is a bit of a scramble to see which conservative blowhard can blow the hardest and elevate themselves into O’Reilly’s seat at Fox News. The results have been mixed.
There is Jesse Watters, who once produced astoundingly racist segments for the O’Reilly Factor, and could easily have continued pandering to O’Reilly’s core audience. Sadly, it seems like Watters may have misjudged how far he could go when he made a blowjob joke about Ivanka Trump on air this week. CNN reports that on Wednesday night, Watters announced he was going on a little vacation from running his mouth on The Five, but would be back Monday. This could be to give people a little time to forget how he sexualized the president’s daughter even more than her dad does, but it may also be a coincidence:
How is Sean Hannity doing? Since Roger Ailes and Bill O’Reilly have fallen from the network’s grace following an unending parade of sexual harassment accusations, Hannity is naturally sensitive about any such accusations directed at him. And they have been. In a segment Wednesday night, Hannity transitioned from a story about Ann Coulter’s cancelled speech at UC Berkeley into some general complains about conservatives being silenced and the “liberal fascism” that has been directed towards him:
“In all seriousness, we are at a turning point a huge turning point when it comes to freedom of speech in the United States of America. I, for one, I refuse to sit back and let conservatives be silenced by these liberal fascists, it’s time to take a stand.
“And as I have explained, I also have become a target of these slanderous attacks. And in my opinion, what happened last Friday, this was designed to be a ‘kill shot.’ In other words, to ruin my career, shut me down once and for all. Literally, I think they had the crosshairs at my head, and my heart, they wanted to destroy me, ruin my career, get me off the air, once and for all.”
Hannity concluded by warning viewers that accusations of sexual harassment are defamation and he has his lawyers looking into retaliatory measures against any accusers or journalists reporting on him.
“I may end up suing some of these outlets because at this point, enough is enough,” he continued, “These attempts to destroy and silence conservative voices it needs to stop or Fox News channel goes away, your favorite talk show hosts go away.”
If only!
There is one Fox News host who doesn’t seem like he’ll be going away any time soon: Tucker Carlson. As obnoxious as you might personally find him, The Hollywood Reporter states that Carlson has done well in Bill O’Reilly’s old time slot, debuting Tucker Carlson Tonight with strong numbers on Monday. He is also shopping around a book, which insiders estimate sell for as much as $15 million.
Carlson may be the new O’Reilly, and if he never sexually harasses anyone, his career looks bright. Unfortunately, if he does sexually harass someone, his career could take a turn in 30 or 40 years and end in early retirement with a multi-million-dollar severance package.
