Bill O'Reilly - Keith Olbermann Feud Escalates; GE Responds to 'Smear Campaign'
"The 'Factor' has been told, but can not confirm, that the General Electric Co. is under investigation in the case," he said on the show. O'Reilly reported that the FBI is investigating what he calls the "pipeline" in which U.S.-made materials for radio-frequency modules are sold to Singapore's Corezing International, which in turn sells them to Iran, where they are used to make roadside bombs, which are finally sent to Iraq and used to injure and kill American military.
"The 'Factor' is not accusing anyone of anything; we are just reporting what we believe to be true. But if any American company did send material to Corezing -- again a major Iranian partner -- they must be investigated to the fullest extent. The lives and suffering of our great military is at stake here," O'Reilly said.
GE spokesman Gary Sheffer told the Associated Press, "We usually do not respond to the misleading and inaccurate claims made on this program because very few people take them seriously." He asserted that GE does not do business with Corezing or produce the radio frequency modules described in the report.
This latest escalation of the feud seems to have broken the cease-fire brokered by the chief executives of the parent companies of the cable channels -- News Corp., which owns Fox, and GE. According to a New York Times story on Aug. 1, the officials worked behind the scenes in mid-May to stop the vitriolic back-and-forth between Olbermann and O'Reilly.
Apparently the news of that report has worsened the feud, which GE now says is the basis for O'Reilly's bomb-making accusations. GE's Sheffer said O'Reilly "took this smear campaign to a new low."
For his part, Olbermann has named O'Reilly one of his "worst persons of the world" multiple times in the shows he's done since the report of the supposed truce, according to the AP. And on Wednesday's show, Olbermann did so again.
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