New York Times:
Bill O’Reilly is leaving Fox News with a payout of up to $25 million, the equivalent of one year of his salary, two people briefed on the matter said Thursday.
For 21st Century Fox, the network’s parent company, payouts related to sexual harassment allegations at Fox News now total more than $85 million. The vast majority of that — up to $65 million in exit packages — is being paid to the men who were ousted from the network because of the harassment allegations.
Mr. O’Reilly, 67, was forced out of the network on Wednesday following the disclosure of a series of sexual harassment allegations against him and an internal investigation that unearthed more women with complaints about his behavior.
His ouster was a stunning departure for 21st Century Fox, which long stood by Mr. O’Reilly even as allegations and settlements started to add up. Mr. O’Reilly, who started at Fox News in 1996, was considered the network’s top asset. His nightly program, “The O’Reilly Factor,’’ generated high ratings and pulled in hundreds of millions in advertising revenues.
But pressure mounted on the company to take action after a New York Times investigation found that Mr. O’Reilly and the company had reached settlements with five women who had complained about sexual harassment or other inappropriate behavior by him. The agreements totaled about $13 million, the majority paid by him.
You know, I would sexually harass a hell of a lot of people, both men and women, for $25 million bucks. I don’t see why these creeps get to fired and then get to leave with these huge exit packages. At some point corporate America is going to have to start writing in zero pay for this kind of wrong-doing.
There are still Foxies who are going to deny wrong-doing. I talked to an acquaintance about a month ago who said that Megyn Kelly deserved the treatment she got from Donald Trump because she was a smart ass. No, no one deserves what Trump did to Megyn Kelly. Remember, I am not even a fan of hers. I still don’t think she deserved that kind of humiliating treatment.
Most of this makes no sense to me. It also was no shock that sexual harassment went on on that network. Just looking at the women, their clothing, and how they sat and presented themselves spoke volumes to me and should have to every other women in America with a brain. It was a T & A show whose goal was to attract angry white men. If they weren’t angry when they started watching, they soon would be.
Tucker Carlson is O’Reilly’s replacement. Talk about dumbing it down. O’Reilly at least garnered a little intellectual respect.
Fox has imploded in on itself. They have always promised the T&A – short skirts, leg positioning and all.
What is a shame – is all the big talkers that were part of Fox and the continued male chauvinism. In 2012 nearly all of the Republican Presidential candidates were on the Fox payroll. If I were them, I would be ashamed to have been part of the organization.
A Sarah Palin clip was shown on Morning Joe this am. She spoke in complete sentences and alluded to some issue when she was on the payroll. However, she did not reveal anything. Stay tuned. She didnt sound smart but I also didn’t think she was on drunks like I have thought the past 8 years or so.
Yes, it has imploded. Karma just came up and took a giant bite out of their butts. That network reeked of male chauvinism from the staging on to the content of many of the programs.
What surprises me is how many women in the world just don’t seem to mind. In fact, they excuse it.
It’s a classic in the legal profession. How much to make this problem go away?