BizJournals Portfolio
Feb 07 2008 12:00am EDT

Bill O'Reilly, Love Him or Hate Him

You probably don't need a poll to tell you that Bill O'Reilly is polarizing, but there you have it. The pugnacious Fox News host is both America's favorite news personality and its second-least favorite, according to an online poll conducted last month by Harris Interactive.

The exact same proportion of respondents -- 23 percent -- picked O'Reilly as their favorite and least-favorite talking head. Katie Couric occasioned a similar ambivalence, with 13 percent choosing her as their favorite, and 16 percent tagging her as their least favorite.

Charles Gibson, Brian Williams, Anderson Cooper and Tim Russert all evoke more fondness than dislike, while Rush Limbaugh, Larry King and Nancy Grace stir up mostly negative emotions.

Interestingly, Keith Olbermann, though seen by many (not least himself) as the liberal counterpart to O'Reilly, generates nowhere near the level of sentiment: Fewer than 10 percent of respondents named him as either favorite or least favorite.


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