This is a rush transcript from "The O'Reilly Factor," October 30, 2008. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
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BILL O'REILLY, HOST: Now for the top story tonight, not only is the press favoring Obama, but many entertainment media people are as well, even those in the high tax zone.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MARTHA STEWART: You know what? You know, suck it in.
NEIL CAVUTO: Really? That is the message, right? That is the message?
M. STEWART: Well, you know, that's the way it is.
CAVUTO: And if they're depressed, they can eat the ham.
M. STEWART: Well, they can budget.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
O'REILLY: OK, they can budget. Well, that's fine, Martha. We'll all budget. But if Obama is elected, madam, I do not expect you, Martha Stewart, to lay off any employees. I expect you, Martha, to suck it in. We'll be watching.
Joining us now to react to all of this, our culture warriors Margaret Hoover and Monica Crowley.
All right, we had a lot of information there. Did you absorb it all in one sitting?
MONICA CROWLEY, PH.D., FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: I absorbed it all in one sitting.
O'REILLY: Amazing.
CROWLEY: That Martha Stewart clip is a classic. That is a Marie Antoinette let them eat cake kind of comment.
O'REILLY: And she looked a little tired in that. Did you notice she looked a little tired? I mean, maybe with Cavuto, he wears you out, but.
CROWLEY: Maybe she's thinking about her expanded tax bill.
O'REILLY: She looks a little tired, Martha does. I'm not sure she understands the total tax implication.
CROWLEY: Right.
O'REILLY: But she better not lay anybody off.
CROWLEY: Well, I mean, look, it's easy to argue for increased taxes when you're worth a billion dollars as Martha Stewart is.
O'REILLY: Yes.
CROWLEY: Look, she should be arguing the exact opposite. It was her creative idea, her vision that built that Martha Stewart empire that made her a billionaire.
O'REILLY: And we give her credit for that.
CROWLEY: Absolutely.
O'REILLY: Yes.
CROWLEY: But that's the beauty of America. Now she should be arguing, look.
O'REILLY: Let other people do it.
CROWLEY: Let other people do it. Let me keep more of my own money so I can hire people, create new products that people want to buy, pour that money back into the economy, and give it to the charities of my choice.
O'REILLY: OK, but she --
CROWLEY: Rather than cause the government confiscated.
O'REILLY: Martha is going to suck it in, Hoover. And I know she's not going to lay off one person if her tax bills go up in her corporation.
Now, you know, I think I laid out a pretty compelling case here why Barack Obama is leading John McCain. You take all the other stuff out of it, all the issues, and we respect people on both sides who, you know, vote their conscience. But boy, is that deck not stacked?
MARGARET HOOVER: The deck is stacked against them, but by the way the deck was always going to be stacked against the Republican candidate. You have an unpopular president. You have an economy that was bad anyway. It got way worse. It is still, sorry to repeat the "Talking Points," but it is actually remarkable that John McCain is doing as well as he is.
And I know we talk about the polls, but I'm going to be upbeat here because the polls are tightening. And in 1948, Dewey turned it around in the last four days of the election. In 1980, Ronald Reagan did the same with Jimmy Carter. This thing can still change. And I am not going to buy the stuff that says this is over. I just don't buy it.
This is tight. John McCain is a fighter. He fights until the end. That's what he has done his whole life. People didn't even think he would get the nomination.
O'REILLY: Do you think McCain has run a good campaign, Hoover?
HOOVER: I think that McCain could have run a better campaign.
O'REILLY: How about you?
CROWLEY: Yes, I agree with that. Yes, I mean, if John McCain wins this, and I agree with Margaret that it's still possible for him to do this, a lot of these polls show him within the margin of error, he could actually be ahead by one point if you look at some of these 3 point spreads. If he wins, it will be in spite of himself because the campaign has been rather undisciplined, especially in contrast with the kind of tight ship that Barack Obama has run.
O'REILLY: Are either of you two ladies a student of history? I mean, Hoover, your great grandfather, yes, your great grandfather --
HOOVER: Great grandfather.
O'REILLY: Was Herbert Hoover.
HOOVER: Was Herbert Hoover.
O'REILLY: Who was in the same situation of presiding over a bad economy. And they booted him out and FDR came in.
HOOVER: Yes.
O'REILLY: But you guys studied history, right?
HOOVER: Right.
O'REILLY: The founding fathers wanted the press and gave the press, me particularly, they actually gave Benjamin Franklin has channeled to me, O'Reilly, the only reason you're on television is because of me, and James Madison, and Thomas Jefferson. I have constitutional protections that most Americans don't have, because my job was to look out for the folks. That's what the media is there to do.
HOOVER: Right.
O'REILLY: When you turn a television network, an entire network into Obama headquarters, Hoover, as MSNBC News has, 73 -- what is it -- 78 or 73 negative toward McCain and 13 -- there -- what can be done about this, if anything?
HOOVER: Well, this is what's happening. I mean, you have responses in the media, right? Unfortunately for the Internet, it's taken news media and communicating information back to a populist place, where everybody has a voice now. And then you have to weed through all the information. There aren't just three voices anymore.
O'REILLY: No, but you have.
HOOVER: There are multiple voices that are getting information out. Yes, it's a big problem. But Bill, it's not nearly as bad as a problem as it was 15 years ago when there were only three major stations.
O'REILLY: Or really? Do you think so? Do you agree with that? Do you think because it's so balkanized now, it's so scattered?
CROWLEY: But I think that the effect of that has been that traditional news operations have turned into opinion-driven entities.
O'REILLY: Well, there's no doubt.
CROWLEY: So the effect of FOX News, for example, cable news in general, that they have taken the op. ed page, what should be on the op. ed page, and hijacked whole news organizations.
O'REILLY: But it's more than that, though. It's more than that. General Electric has billions of dollars at its disposal. And it is using its money and power to try to get one man elected president.
CROWLEY: Right. And I would argue.
O'REILLY: Now Hearst used to do this. If you watch "Citizen Kane," when you go back into the '20s and '30s, Hearst tried to do it, but General Electric is going to be successful.
CROWLEY: But I would argue that it has always been that way.
O'REILLY: Really?
CROWLEY: That the elite media has already been on the left. They've always been cheerleading Democratic and liberal candidates.
O'REILLY: To this extent?
CROWLEY: No, the intensity this time is much stronger.
O'REILLY: Right.
CROWLEY: I mean, in the past when Washington press core members have been polled about who they have voted for as president, 90 percent of the press core vote for Democrats.
O'REILLY: Yes, 90 percent. But this is out in the open. There's no subterfuge here.
HOOVER: This is why Republicans have to be better. And this is why Ronald Reagan was a great communicator. He got around them. He got around the press. He sold directly to the American people.
O'REILLY: That's a good point there.
HOOVER: And went around them. And that's the reason that Wurzelbacher has been so good.
O'REILLY: Right, and I don't know.
HOOVER: Because he's made McCain's points for him.
O'REILLY: I can say flat out McCain has not out-campaigned Obama. He has not out-campaigned him.
HOOVER: Look, what he hasn't out-communicated him. And that's been a major.
O'REILLY: No, he hasn't out-campaigned.
HOOVER: He hasn't been able to.
O'REILLY: You know, he had three shots at him, one on one. And he didn't knock him out. And that.
HOOVER: I think he did the third time. I think the third time he nailed him. He knocked him off his game.
O'REILLY: No, he might have rattled him a little bit, but he didn't knock him down.
CROWLEY: And also, with the huge money advantage that Obama has, he's been able to buy time on all of these networks.
O'REILLY: Sure. You saw it last night.
CROWLEY: Pre-media.
O'REILLY: Thirty-five million as opposed to 3 million for McCain.
HOOVER: The last.
O'REILLY: But McCain had an opportunity.
HOOVER: The last poll taken is Tuesday, November 4th. We will see what the American people say.
O'REILLY: All right. Margaret Hoover hanging in there.
CROWLEY: Me, too.
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