Going to Extremes...

Hi, I'm Bill O'Reilly.  Thanks for watching us tonight.

Some amazing things have happened to me.  First, I had to fly to Colorado and California last week, and there were no lines.  Things went very smoothly at both United and American Airlines.  The only problem I saw was at Southwest Airlines in Los Angeles.  That was a zoo.

Also, congratulations to Senator Hillary Clinton.  That's right, I am complimenting Mrs. Clinton for her good work in getting an investigation rolling to see if the air quality around ground zero is hurting the folks down there.  Good work is good work, doesn't matter who does it.

"Talking Points" memo this evening is about going to extremes.  We always caution people here on The Factor not to led ideology cloud thinking, but some Americans will never get the message.

On the left, it is still very apparent that many American liberals continue to push the income redistribution philosophy, although few will admit it.  An exception is Robert Reich, who is running for the governor of Massachusetts.  Dr. Reich freely admits he wants to play Robin Hood by taxing the well-off to the max.

Problem with high taxes -- and we have very high taxes right now in America -- is that they go against the original intent of the founding fathers.  This country was set up to reward achievement and to get the government off the people's backs and out of their wallets.  That's what we fought for time and time again.

Have you noticed that Social Security taxes have gone up for anyone making more than $80,000 a year?  That negates much of the Bush income tax cut.

Now.  Some Americans think 80K is a lot of money, and it is if you live in Mississippi.  But if you live in San Francisco or Boston or even Chicago and have a family, that money will go real fast, because the government takes nearly half of it.  That's flat-out wrong.

And the worst part of it is that the liberals who call for higher and higher taxes never call for strict oversight of that money, and the waste is staggering.  Many Democrats on Capitol Hill really don't believe in redistributing income, especially if it's theirs, but they know that big spending, which is really vote-buying, is an effective way to get reelected in some places.

Now, on the hard right, there is similar foolishness.  I've received scores of letters telling me that the Enron situation is nothing, that the company did nothing wrong, that it's the investors' fault for buying the stock.  Another fallacious point of view.  Mutual funds, pension plans, and most brokerage houses all believed the lies Enron was putting out there.  The individual investor didn't have a chance in the face of that fraud.

What the hard right fails to acknowledge is that the federal government has an obligation to protect Americans, not only from foreign terrorists but from big business and others in this country who break the law.  The feds are there to make sure that everyday Americans are not screwed by ruthless and powerful entities.

Working Americans pay taxes for that protection, and all too often the authorities let us down.  They better not in the Enron case.

And that's the memo.

The Most Ridiculous Item of the Day

Time now for "The Most Ridiculous Item of the Day,"

The Factor has lots of viewers in Australia on Foxtel.  And that country has know to take a very libertarian approach to such things as prostitution.  In New South Wales, the government has even issued workplace safety tips for the ladies and I guess some guys.  Those guidelines include warnings about back injuries from bad mattresses and wrist injuries from massages.

The information is included in a pamphlet called "Getting on top of health and safety." It might be ridiculous.

— You can watch Bill O'Reilly's Talking Points and "Most Ridiculous Item" weeknights at 8 & 11p.m. ET on the Fox News Channel. Send your comments to: oreilly@foxnews.com