From the Drudge Report:
Prior to September 29, 2004, Mackris never complained to anyone in authority at Fox about sexual harassment by O’Reilly, despite having received and being well aware of the clearly written harassment prevention policies and procedures of Fox and its ultimate parent, The News Corporation Limited (“News Corp”). Attached as Exhibit A is a copy of Fox’s harassment policy contained in its Employee Handbook, which Mackris received when hired. Attached as Exhibit B is a copy of the “Equal Employment Opportunity And Unlawful Harassment” section of News Corp’s “Standards of Business Conduct,” which Fox reissued to Mackris and its other employees on or about September 8, 2004.On September 29, 2004, however, Defendant Morelli, Mackris’s attorney, sent a letter to several executives of Fox and News Corp which is attached as Exhibit C. Morelli stated in his letter that he represented a Fox employee who was allegedly being harassed by “one of Fox’s most prominent on-air personalities.” Although he did not identify O’Reilly or Mackris by name in the letter, Morelli wrote that he and the Fox employee were then prepared to sue Plaintiffs, and therefore a settlement discussion would be in Plaintiffs’ best interests because the lawsuit “would be extremely damaging to both Fox’s reputation and the reputation of the individual involved.”
Fox and News Corp representatives spoke with and met several times with Morelli and his associate, David S. Ratner. Mackris attended one of the meetings. At those meetings and during telephone conversations, Defendants demanded $60 million in hush money to keep quiet and never once lowered this outrageous, extortionate demand. At one of the meetings, Morelli allowed the Fox and News Corp representatives to read a draft of a harassment complaint (“the draft complaint”) that he threatened to file on Mackris’s behalf. The draft complaint contained several lengthy block quotes of statements that O’Reilly allegedly made to Mackris. The length of the quotes and the specific verbiage used made it appear that Mackris was taping O’Reilly during the conversations. Morelli, though, refused to permit the Fox and News Corp representatives to have a copy of the complete draft complaint, providing them only with an excerpt.
The whole thing really depends upon whether Mackris has the tapes of O’Reilly or not. If she does, then he’s through as the king of faux conservative media. He’ll survive, of course, just like Dick Morris and others have, but he’ll lose an awful lot of support from true believing conservatives, even some who are otherwise Three Monkey Republicans. The extortion bit is irrelevant as is the ludicrous demand for $60 million. This is primarily about destroying O’Reilly’s credibility by exposing him as the fraud that I, and many others, have always believed him to be.
One thing that strikes me as believable about this is the fact that Mackris is not particularly attractive. I’ve noticed that the women who get treated like this aren’t the delectable Heather Nauert types, they’re the plain to slightly attractive kind that men like Bill O’Reilly, Bill Clinton and others think, sometimes accurately, will appreciate the unexpected attention from a big shot.
Note too, the emphasis on non-intercourse sexual activity. This is very remniscent of the Clintonian pyloctomy. It can’t possibly be cheating if he’s not even touching the woman, right?