The other day Bill O'Reilly did one of those quiet shifts in his narrative that he is careful never to announce or draw too much attention to -- mainly because if you're paying attention, it means he was dead wrong about issues he's previously taken vociferous positions on.

Essentially, he admitted that Bush has to take some blame for failing to recognize the oncoming recession -- which is to say, the recession is real and not just a figment of the imaginations of the media and the "nutty left."

In other words, he's been dead wrong all this time and he owes everyone in his audience an apology.

O'Reilly: Larry, look. The reason I didn't get an exit interview with President Bush -- and we asked -- and I have a good relationship with him -- was that he knew I was going to ask one key question, Larry, one. And that is, Why didn't you guys see this terrible recession when it was coming? Why didn't you see that? He didn't answer that today, did he? Larry Elder: And the reason he didn't answer it is because it is a long, complicated answer, and primarily the reason nobody saw it, or very few people saw it, was because of government interference. O'Reilly: But he's the president. He's the president. He's the guy the who's got to protect the folks, and the folks got hammered. And you're right, it's complicated and long, but that really sunk him, even more than Iraq or the war on terror.

Gee, I dunno, Bill. I wonder if Bush cheerleaders like you -- who angrily shouted down anyone who talked about the dire long-term consequences of Bushonomics -- might have helped persuade him he was doing the right thing. Ya think?

And in case Larry Elder missed it, there were a number of people who saw it coming, and saw it from a long way off. One of them was Paul Krugman, the recent Nobel Economics Prize winner.

Some of you may even recall that nasty, finger-wagging, threatening encounter with Krugman that Bill O'Reilly had on Tim Russert's show back in 2004: