I rarely watch "The O’Reilly Factor" on Fox News because:

   a) I don’t care for O’Reilly’s point of view
   b) I find his manner and personality offensive.

So, as I was lazily channel surfing on Palin Day (need I say more?), I made a quick pit stop to hear what Big Bill had to say. What I heard made me stop in my tracks. Rather than leading a reasoned discussion on why John McCain had just picked an obscure, neophyte Alaskan politician as his running mate, O’Reilly was instead lambasting MSNBC for its coverage of the announcement.

It seems he didn’t like the words MSNBC had streamed across the bottom of the screen as Governor Palin was being introduced to the masses. To wit: "How many houses will McCain have now?"

O’Reilly was right to suggest the rival network was editorializing instead of reporting. But, he himself went far beyond reporting on MSNBC’s non-reporting. He went absolutely ballistic. He suggested the network should be ashamed of itself, called Tom Brokaw and Brian Williams "cowards" for not speaking up and implied that MSNBC’s left-wing rhetoric was being dictated by Jeff Immelt, CEO of General Electric, MSNBC’s parent company. Puh-leese.

I dislike blatant editorializing on either side of the equation. But, for an outspoken conservative like O’Reilly to point a finger at MSNBC for its liberal editorializing is akin to the proverbial pot calling the kettle black.

It’s sad to see how divided our country has become. The rich have never been richer. The poor have never been poorer (at least not since 1929), the red states have never been redder and the blue states never bluer. And we’re stuck with ersatz journalists like O’Reilly and ersatz news networks like MSNBC. Is it any wonder this country’s image has never been worse?