Geraldo: You Shouldn't Become Parent Unless Licensed By Government

January 9th, 2012 7:55 PM

Think your government has more than enough on its hands? Geraldo Rivera wants it to do so much more.

On his new WABC radio show Friday, Rivera cited an incident that day involving a Brooklyn mother suspected of killing her 3-year-old daughter, saying this (audio clips after page break) --

I swear to God, you talk about sickos, you talk about sickos. You should need to have a license to have a child. You should be vetted. I think I can't stand these stories. I've covered so many of these toddler-torture murders. It's just something that is unbelievable.

Minutes later, Rivera enthused over the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, followed by his criticism of  the agency as destined to become a haven for patronage hacks (audio) --

You know, I like the idea of consumer protection, this new agency, for example, but I can just see what's going to happen. You're going to have all the secretaries that campaigned for Obama in this administration or Bush in the last administration or Romney or Obama or whoever it's going to be going forward, they're all going to get those coveted jobs, they're going to be assistant secretary to the secretary of the deputy of the this and that, and it's all going to be our tax money. It used to be, when I was a younger man, I used to think, you know, you know, let's throw money at this problem, let's fix this problem. And it's just when see the way government operates, government can do no right, almost.

Still like the idea of this new agency? How about licensing parents while we're at it?

Later on Friday, Rivera appeared on "The O'Reilly Factor" and got into an argument with Bill O'Reilly over Casey Anthony, as described by Brian Maloney at the Radio Equalizer (h/t for YouTube audio clip) --

Within a period of less than 12 hours the King of All Media Hackery jumped on Bill O'Reilly for being much too critical of (insert your own descriptive language here) Casey Anthony, but then told radio listeners he advocates government licensing and "vetting" of all prospective parents in America.

In Geraldo Bizarro World, it's give Casey the benefit of the doubt while real mothers and fathers are guilty until proven innocent. Could anything be nuttier?

Rivera passing himself off as a conservative comes to mind.