NEW YORK, NEW YORK — Embattled and now former Fox News host Bill O’Reilly would often have contributor Jesse B. Watters on his show. Watters became known for his “Watters’ World” video bits in which he’d often times provoke and mock liberals in highly edited segments, in what many call a “D-rate version of Daily Show segments.” O’Reilly was recently ousted from his position atop the network’s flagship show when it was revealed that Fox News paid over $13 million in settlements to women claiming sexual misconduct against him over the years.
Watters recently got himself into some hot water himself when he made some comments about First Lady Ivanka Trump. Watters was on a panel show and seemed to make an oral sex joke about President Trump’s daughter/wife.
As reported by Think Progress:
During a discussion of the clip, Watters offered this grossly inappropriate non sequitur with a smirk on his face: “I really liked how she was speaking into that microphone.” (source)
Mr. Watters took to his Twitter account to try and dispel the growing backlash and anger over his comments. Many feel his joke symbolizes and crystalizes the pervasive misogyny that exists in the culture of the cable news network. Watters’ tweet attempted to cover up the joke by saying it was about the First Lady’s “voice” and compared it to a “smooth jazz radio DJ.”
On air I was referring to Ivanka's voice and how it resonates like a smooth jazz radio DJ. This was in no way a joke about anything else.
— Jesse Watters (@JesseBWatters) April 26, 2017
Apparently wanting to further quell the fires of public outcry, Watters used a radio interview with Rush Limbaugh this morning to attempt an explanation on why he made the joke in the first place.
“Look, Rush,” Watters said, “you and I both know that Bill O’Reilly was a titan in this industry. He was a mainstay at my network for decades, and he groped and harassed like a real Alpha male. He was no cuck, I’ll tell you that much.”
Limbaugh helped Watters lament having to “crawl out from behind Bill’s handsy, gropey, shadow.”
“Yeah, it’s true,” Mr. Watters told Limbaugh, “Bill left me some big shoes to fill and huge boobs to grope, no doubt. And so I might have tried a little too hard and let the Mad Men thing out live on air. Bill was always smart to come off as the family values white guy on TV and then in private be a lecherous douchbag.”
Watters told Limbaugh he simply got his “wires crossed” and said something during the broadcast he’d rather have “saved for after hours chit chat with the dames at the network.” Limbaugh told Watters that next time he should slip some Oxycontin into everyone’s drinks in studio so they don’t act so surprised and quickly change the subject again. Then, Limbaugh posited, people wouldn’t get the immediate impression Watters had done anything wrong.
“If we don’t live in a country where men can say sexually explicit stuff about women without being called on it,” Limbaugh said, “we clearly don’t live in America anymore. Sure, no one is threatening jail time, or even your job, but still, we clearly are under assault every day by the forces of liberalism, which we all know is a mental disease.”
Fox News, Watters, and Limbaugh could not be reached for comment.
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