Businessweek Archives

With Friends Like Bill O'Reilly, Detroit Doesn't Need Enemies

In his March 14th broadcast, Fox News bloviator Bill O’Reilly aptly criticized UAW President Ron Gettelfinger for testifying before Congress that higher fuel economy regulations for automobiles would result in the loss of tens of thousands of more jobs. This argument on the part of the union holds about as much water as O’Reilly’s own “Conspiracy Against Christmas” theory. Yet, ironically, the bloviator was correct in his criticism of Gettelfinger’s statement.

But where BOR hopped the rails entirely was when he said that he was in the market for a new car, very much wanted to buy American, but couldn’t find anything that got 30 mpg. He mumbled something about Detroit products getting no better than 20mpg, and criticized the auto industry for not stepping up.

Not that I’m saying the industry couldn’t have done better over the last 25 years boosting fuel economy. But BOR’s off-handed comments left his viewers with the notion that Detroit isn’t making anything that gets 30mpg.

Perhaps BOR hasn’t gone to, nor read Consumer Reports. Or perhaps his tastes, given his multi-million dollar net worth, simply don’t allow him to take notice of the following models:

Chevy Malibu: 24/34

Pontiac G6: 23/33

Mercury Milan 23/31

Chrysler Sebring 22/30

There are many more. Okay, while it’s true that the average MPG of those cars is below 30, they do get more than 30 mpg on the highway. BOR lives on Long Island, so he is in a lot of stop-and-go traffic on the Long Island Expressway and in Manhattan. Sounds like a good candidate for a hybrid. BOR…Dude…the Ford Escape and Mercury Mariner SUVs gets 36/31. The Saturn Vue Green Line gets 27/32. Surely, you could spend some of your dough and get either vehicle dolled up with some custom wheels and interior bling to suit your station in life. You could also get a Jeep Patriot. That should suit your image. The Patriot gets 25/29. That’s pretty darn close to the 30 mpg you are looking for.

If you are a regular guy the way you say…then why not a Ford Focus. That’ll get you 32/37 mpg.

For a guy who seemed to imply that he was a booster of the U.S. car industry, BOR did a great job of dissing it through his own lack of information about what’s on the market. BOR…check out and

The Epic Hack

(enter your email)
(enter up to 5 email addresses, separated by commas)

Max 250 characters

blog comments powered by Disqus