History 101: Bill O'Reilly Gets It Wrong Again

For the second time in a week, Fox News host Bill O'Reilly got his history wrong while quizzing a colleague on the cable news channel. O'Reilly asked Fox News Business correspondent Terry Keenan if she knew "what happened in France when Louis XIV and Marie Antoinette were eating cake and everyone else was eating, you know, sewer rats?"

The only problem with O'Reilly's history lesson? Louis XIV, the so-called Sun King, was not married to Marie Antoinette. The Austrian beauty was married to Louis Seize (or Louis XVI for HuffPost's non-Francophone readers).

Watch MSNBC's Dan Abrams correct the historical record for the cable news host:

Comments

[funwithwarcrimes]

What exactly were you expecting from Faux News? Real News? Real facts? It's a joke, it's a tabloid on the air -- they aren't even remotely concerned with news, facts or anything real...it's just drama and entertainment to them -- excuse me a minute while I go throw-up.

[3Gs]

Bill: Yeah, but you know what I meant! What a loser.

[CharlieMarlowe]

What she actually said was, "Let them shout for Iced Tea!"

[miquelon]

Getting Louis XIV and Louis XVI confused is a social faux-pas in French circles. It's almost as bad as getting Obama and Osama mixed up. No really ;-)

[genseric]

Mixing up Louis 14 with the 16 is a pretty easy mistake to make. The question is does he know the significance of the error or was it a misspeaking kind of thing. My experience has been that most people know very little history even when it's just a few decades old. Look at the liberal foreign policy lions of today. They were the same guys (Biden, Dodd, etc.) who were saying Reagan was an idiot for not pushing the nuclear freeze in Europe, an action which would have frozen into place hundreds of Soviet SS20s in Eastern Europe. Through strong measures of deploying Pershing II and Cruise missiles, Reagan forced the Soviets to remove all of their missiles from Europe, known as the Zero Option. The liberals of the time laughed at Reagan's proposal. Does Obama know about this? Supposedly he is an intellectual but I doubt he knows very much history. I may be wrong, it's just an impression I have.

[DASM]

Je falafale, donc je suis...

[TimeJumper]

"Je pense, donc je suis."

[miquelon]

René Descartes' cleaning woman is rumoured to have said "je pense donc j'essuie"

[Torus34]

Aw, c'mon, now. Mr. O'Reilly never claimed to be an historian.

In fact, he has never claimed to be anything.

Which, when you think about it, is just about right. He isn't.

[punch]

Harvard, must be proud

[DemonicLaughterInc]

Bill O'Reilly, the "LouisBill Thugger."

[berkeleygirl1962]

I thought Marie A. was married to Louis Vuitton of Luggage fame.

[desertdweller]

No, she was married to King Louie of bowling shirt fame...

[dankitti]

Of course Julie has to move her laptop for the reasons mentioned. That's always fun.

[Heraldblog]

Aprés moi, la falafel!

[chaucerfiend]

And Marie-Antoinette never said "let them eat cake." The Aristos had said the same thing about a Spanish princess years earlier. The French just can't handle foreign queens.

[NoMercy]

You've been dancing in Paris again?

[dankitti]

This is true. It was actually Freddie Mercury who said that. Erm okay, supposedly quoting Marie. Who didn't say that.

[Strain]

If I remember my history correctly (not the type you get in school, but the public library), it was one of Louie's aunts who said that. Actually, Marie was well loved by the poor in France, because she made it one of her personal responsibilities to take food and clothing, as well as money to them.

[miquelon]

"The French just can't handle foreign queens" - Your epidermis - I mean prejudice is showing.

[alltwisty]

I heard that, when informed that the peasants were without bread, she had actually said, "Why can't they just have brioches?" not understanding that unlike her own lot, who had an abundant selection of bread, brioches, etc at their tables, that bread was all the people had to eat at all.

[Durango]

I thought it was the finance minister who said "Let them eat Grass."

Sometime before they cut his head off, stuffed his mouth full of grass stuck his head on a pike and paraded it around the streets of Paris.

Hmm. Wonder how that might work for modern pundicrats?

[desertdweller]

Comment dit-on falafel en français?