Huh?

I learned two things about Bill O'Reilly in recent weeks that should not both be true. A time-space continuum must rupture into tiny, weeping pieces if both things exist in the same universe.

First: During a December 13 episode of the Factor, O'Reilly tackled the issue of gay parenting as part of the Right's hilarious implosion over Mary Cheney's pregnancy. He applied to the discussion all of his usual keen insight -- disregarding years of research contradicting his position that "nature dictates a dad and a mom is the optimum" as something he didn't want to "deal with," and utterly failing to grasp the distinction between the biological function of procreation and the purely cultural function of parenting (even after a guest explained it to him in simple words and short sentences). No surprises there. Pretty standard fare. But then he asked the show-stopping question (well, it stopped the show for me, because at that point I just had to turn it off):

Why, he wondered, if same-sex couples can be as good of parents as not-same-sex couples, "wouldn't nature then make it that anybody could get pregnant by eating a cupcake?"

I'll leave that for your contemplation, because there is truly nothing I can add to it.

Second: Bill O'Reilly -- the same Bill O'Reilly who saw some sort of analogy between same-sex parenting and conception by frosting -- has a Master's degree from the Kennedy School of Government. At Harvard.

Huh.

So Bill O'Reilly might not actually be an idiot. Maybe he just plays one on TV.