Bill O’Reilly has made his impact on the hip hop community this past year. First Ludicris, then Snoop, and most recently, Jay-Z. O’Reilly recently took Jay-Z and certain elementary schools to task for Jay-Z appearing as ‘principal for the day.’ Russell Simmons appeared on “The O’Reilly Factor” this past week to defend his employee. Here are some quotes from the show:
O’Reilly: “All right. A lot of people said why are the public schools legitimizing a guy like Jay-Z? Why wouldn’t you bring in somebody who has a better moral message? What say you?”
Simmons: “Well, first, you have to understand rap is a voice of a lot of voiceless people. You may hear some poverty and ignorance in their voice, but then thats their reality, in some cases, and that reality, that truth, I think, is very relevant and important. You know, I was in the Cong — Senate hearings, and a senator said that he thought it was very important that every young, 15 — every 15-year-old American should see “Saving Private Ryan,” and, in that case, I think every 15-year-old American should know about the waters (ph) down the block.”
Simmons: “Let me say Jay-Z is a person, let us not forget, who called for students to come out and protest New York City’s mayor’s budget cuts. A hundred…”
AD LOADING...
O’Reilly: “Oh, so what? Anybody can do that.”
Simmons: “No one can — that you know can bring 100,000 people to city hall on six days’ notice…And those hundred thousand people came out, and the mayor put $345 million back in the budget.”
O’Reilly: “All right, but I’m sure Mayor Bloomberg is not going to say Jay-Z is the cause for…”
Simmons: “The hundred thousand kids were the cause.”
AD LOADING...
O’Reilly: “Look, here’s — here’s the bottom line on this. To get out of poverty, you need to be smart, you need to understand the system, and you need to work within it, unless you are a Jay-Z or an NBA basketball player or a football player. His message is: Screw the system, don’t get educated…”
