This is a RUSH transcript from "The O'Reilly Factor," September 18, 2013. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.
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O'REILLY: Thanks for staying with us, I'm Bill O'Reilly. In the "Miller Time" segment tonight, a new ABC News poll says even though Americans believe President Obama botched the Libyan situation badly, his overall job approval rating still stands at 47 percent, the same number, 47 percent disapprove.
Joining us now from Chicago, the sage of Southern California who's in the Midwest, Dennis Miller. So, why does so many Americans continue to support Mr. Obama.
DENNIS MILLER, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: By the way, Billy, the guy who drives you to and from work every day, what's his name again, Zen Mode?
O'REILLY: Carl.
MILLER: What is he, Israeli.
O'REILLY: Yes, but I have to deal with the people who are throwing rocks at the car.
MILLER: The zen mode.
(LAUGHTER)
You, the zen mode. Get out of here.
O'REILLY: Come on, Miller.
MILLER: You have a driver.
O'REILLY: I know but I have to deal with the chaos. Don't you get that.
MILLER: I'm not sure, OK. All right. So, you're Mr. Mellow.
(LAUGHTER)
O'REILLY: Miller, let me just give it to you. There are no tinted windows like out in Santa Barbara where you live. They're not allowed here in New York. People see me in the back of the car, OK. Hey.
MILLER: Ailes -- Ailes doesn't allow you to drive. You're the mother stone over there.
(LAUGHTER)
You'd be in fights every day, they'd have no show.
O'REILLY: I've got to get a helicopter. I've got to get a helicopter, that's what I need. All right.
MILLER: Oh, you are a piece of work.
O'REILLY: Obama.
MILLER: Barack Obama's approval rating.
O'REILLY: Yes.
MILLER: I wouldn't say -- obviously, to me, the president is not a man for all seasons.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
But he certainly is a man for this season. I think he's completely emblematic of his time. One thing I've noticed about young people -- and I meet him through my kids, or I meet him when I'm not performing, it's a very --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
-- non-judgmental generation. They don't judge. So, it doesn't surprise me that Obama can still have good approval ratings. If you poll individual topics, I think you'll find that a lot of people don't like the way it's going.
But if you ask them to judge the president, they'd go, "Well, I'm not a person to judge. I don't judge."
O'REILLY: All right, and that's an interesting observation. Do you think that will hold if a Republican gets nominated or gets selected. Because, certainly, --
MILLER: No.
O'REILLY: -- they judge Bush and Cheney all day long.
MILLER: Yes but, Billy, everybody seems to be thinking -- everybody always says, "Well, if we stay on this road," and I don't. We've gone past the point.
We've fallen through the looking glass last November 6th. A man who posited himself as a world beater, and even his devotees whenever he gets in a vine say, "Well, he's helpless against that."
A helpless world beater, a man at the center of it all who perpetually claims he's out of the loop on any given issue was elected the leader by the American people. I get it, it's America 180.
O'REILLY: I think that that's what it's about. I think that they don't want to admit --
MILLER: Huh.
O'REILLY: -- they who voted for Barack Obama, they made a mistake. I think they're frustrated with Syria, ObamaCare, the economy, the national debt.
But when it comes right down to it, the people who pulled the lever for the president don't want to say, "You know, probably not a good decision." I think that's what you're saying.
MILLER: Yes, well, when they pulled that lever, they're yanking my chain. And while, --
(LAUGHTER)
-- you know, the people fiddle, Rome twerks, it would appear to me.
O'REILLY: All right.
MILLER: And, now, we've got Vladimir Putin. We screwed this thing up so bad, Putin is going to end up being the new Kissinger.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
Shuttle diplomacy.
(LAUGHTER)
He'll get a Peace Prize later in the year. And they can pin it right on his chest plate. That's how strong he is.
O'REILLY: No, they can't because it would hurt him because he's not going to wear a shirt to the ceremony. He's not, he's going to -- since I was going to go.
MILLER: Oh, my God. That is --
(LAUGHTER)
-- this is him. That was him and Obama out camping together.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
I don't know what the hell has happened to the world but --
O'REILLY: You know when President -- when George W. Bush said he could look into Putin's soul, he was right. There was nothing blocking it.
(LAUGHTER)
He could just see right in there.
MILLER: Because he had no shirt on.
O'REILLY: Very good, Miller. You're picked right up on that, man.
MILLER: All right. Oh, yes, football.
O'REILLY: All right, let's go to the NFL. All right, it's week two in the NFL and 40 percent of the league --
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
-- is on the disabled list, including most of the ball boys. I mean, how violent is this league.
MILLER: Well, Billy, it's very violent that's why it's popular. You realize that.
O'REILLY: Yes, I am.
MILLER: I mean nobody wants anybody -- listen, nobody wants anybody crippled. And that's -- I view Goodell like Roger O'Bomber, you know, like he's like a lower case Obama.
He's doing the same thing to the league that Obama is doing to the country. They're trying to safety-proof every day life. And it isn't safe.
And you know something, Goodell is full of it when he talks about player safety because he's also the guy who have to shepherd in the 18-game season. If football is unsafe, and it is, --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
-- and 23-year-olds want to knowingly come and sign up, and become millionaires, and date every hot woman on the planet, and run the risk of leading that life, for the NFL to get in charge of it and say, "Well, we've got to change this, we've got to change that. And we also might want to go to 18 seasons."
That rings a little hollow. If it is unsafe, cut it back to 12 games a year and we'll believe you, Roger Goodell. But don't micromanage --
O'REILLY: Why do you think --
MILLER: -- a basically violent endeavor.
O'REILLY: This is a serious question because you were the Monday Night Football analyst for a couple of years. When I was growing up, we had the NFL here in New York, New York Giants, legendary guys -- Wyatt Tittle, Charlie Connelly, Alex Webster, Frank Gifford, all of these guys, they stayed on the field for the 12, 14 games.
Most of them. Now, they're just wiped out. Almost all of them are wiped out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MILLER: Billy, but see, this is how we remember things and how we think our world is so precious. Nobody ever got hit harder than Frank Gifford by Chuck Bednarik.
O'REILLY: That's true.
MILLER: Bednarik stood over him, and people say he celebrated. He didn't. He just was pleased about the hit. Football is --
O'REILLY: And Darryl Stingley got paralyzed. You know, yes, --
(END VIDEO CLIP)
-- but you know my point, that most of the star players played the entire season. Not anymore.
MILLER: Well, John McEnroe is a genius. John McEnroe always -- and John really is smart about this stuff.
He talks about you want to return tennis to some sort of skill level and just, instead of bomb it, play with wooden rackets.
The football helmets and stuff have gotten so perfect and so lethal that you have men who are evolving physically, careening into each other at a higher rate of speed on moor --
O'REILLY: Yes, that's true. They're much bigger.
MILLER: And here in fields. If you want to make it a little safer, you might get Conner and Tulip and think about leather helmets. And swear to God, that would slow a guy down.
O'REILLY: All right, Dennis Miller, everybody. We have an announcement. The first "Bolder-Fresher" show of 2014 will be in Orlando, Florida.
(LAUGHTER)
Saturday night, January 18th, at the Bob Carr Center. Tickets go on sale tomorrow morning but Premium Members can get them tonight on billoreilly.com.
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