Merged: Juan Williams Fired From NPR

[maxiep]

Juan Williams gets fired from NPR for highlighting the problem with political correctness by being politically incorrect.

http://www.mediaite.com/online/npr-...remarks-made-about-muslims-on-oreilly-factor/

I am a long-time NPR supporter, but I'm not contributing the next time they come calling. Shameful.

 

[barfo]

Re: Ridiculous

Juan Williams gets fired from NPR for highlighting the problem with political correctness by being politically incorrect.

http://www.mediaite.com/online/npr-...remarks-made-about-muslims-on-oreilly-factor/

I am a long-time NPR supporter, but I'm not contributing the next time they come calling. Shameful.

Odd. If the quoted statement is all he said/ got fired for, I don't get it. That doesn't even seem to me to be politically incorrect. If he's afraid of Muslims, he's afraid of Muslims. That's just a statement about himself. Too bad for him, but (unless his job involved interviewing lots of Muslims) I don't see how it affects his job.

barfo

 

[maxiep]

Re: Ridiculous

Odd. If the quoted statement is all he said/ got fired for, I don't get it. That doesn't even seem to me to be politically incorrect. If he's afraid of Muslims, he's afraid of Muslims. That's just a statement about himself. Too bad for him, but (unless his job involved interviewing lots of Muslims) I don't see how it affects his job.

barfo

You said it better than I did. Juan Williams is as fair-minded as they come. He said a lot of things in the Washington Post that only a black person could say. I can't believe with his track record they didn't cut him any slack. Of course, it could be that they didn't like his freelancing for an organization like FOX and were just looking for an opportunity to can him.

 

[BGrantFan]

Re: Ridiculous

George Soros just gave $1.8 million to NPR.

Plus, this NPR contributor apparently speaks the truth regarding Jesse Helms!

“If there is retributive justice, he’ll get AIDS from a transfusion, or one of his grandchildren will get it"

http://www.mediaresearch.org/cyberalerts/2003/cyb20031020.asp

 

[Denny Crane]

Re: Ridiculous

Cut the federal budget by ending the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, or at least stop using public money to fund it.

I really don't get this firing. Yeah, what he said was politically incorrect out of context. In context, it was honest and has more to do with the hype about muslim terrorists than it does about him having some issue with muslims.

 

[Denny Crane]

Re: Ridiculous

And here's the denouement:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=130712737&ps=cprs

Late Wednesday night, NPR issued a statement praising Williams as a valuable contributor but saying it had given him notice that it is severing his contract. "His remarks on The O'Reilly Factor this past Monday were inconsistent with our editorial standards and practices, and undermined his credibility as a news analyst with NPR," the statement read.

Williams' presence on the largely conservative and often contentious prime-time talk shows of Fox News has long been a sore point with NPR News executives.

His status was earlier shifted from staff correspondent to analyst after he took clear-cut positions about public policy on television and in newspaper opinion pieces.

That's a quote from NPR's own statement about the firing from their own WWW site.

Looks like they were waiting for an excuse to get rid of him.

Anyone who's listened to NPR and says they don't take clear-cut positions about public policy are liars. Nothing wrong with taking the positions, but at least be honest about it.

 

[maxiep]

Re: Ridiculous

Thanks for the quote, Denny. Gee, do you think Mara Liasson is hearing footsteps?

As I said before, I've been a financial supporter of NPR since I was a freshman in college. This decision and the reasoning behind it means they won't get another penny from me. I changed my radio station last night. In fact, this morning for the first time since I can remember since living in the US, I didn't wake up to Morning Edition.

 

[HailBlazers]

Re: Ridiculous

George Soros just gave $1.8 million to NPR.

Say no more. It was probably part of the conditions.

 

[maxiep]

Re: Ridiculous

Say no more. It was probably part of the conditions.

I think so. And congratulations to the folks at NPR who condemn society's sellouts for selling out themselves.

 

[maxiep]

Re: Ridiculous

Here is an example of NPR's sensitivity: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=120344047

 

[BGrantFan]

Re: Ridiculous

So the far-right/privately-funded cable channel FauxNews allows an NPR liberal like Juan Williams on their channel to express his opinions, yet taxpayer-funded NPR can't stand having a FoxNews liberal on their public airwaves, and was looking for an excuse to can him? And FauxNews is the narrow-minded channel?

Up is down.

 

[HailBlazers]

Re: Ridiculous

...do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around, that's what its all A Bout

 

[ABM]

Juan Williams' (NPR) Firing Causing Conservative Backlash

Interesting.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/10/21/npr-juan-williams-firing-_n_771632.html

NPR is facing a storm of criticism for its decision to fire Juan Williams after his comments about Muslims on Fox News, with several prominent conservatives calling for NPR's government funding to be cut and refusing to appear on the network anymore.

Speaking on Fox News, both Bill O'Reilly and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich called for Congress to investigate NPR and cut its government funding in the wake of Juan Williams' firing from the organization.

Williams, who said Monday that he gets "nervous" when he sees Muslims on planes, also spoke out Thursday morning, telling Fox News' "Happening Now" that nobody at NPR had spoken to him before making the choice to terminate his contract.

Speaking on the same program, O'Reilly told host Jon Scott that NPR had been trying to get rid of Williams for some time, due to his dual role as a contributor to Fox News.

He called NPR a "left-wing outfit that wants one opinion," and went on to say that, if NPR were an entirely private institution, he would have no issue with that. But, he said, since NPR gets government funding, he thought that money should be frozen.

"I'm calling immediately...for the immediate suspension of every taxpayer dollar going into the National Public Radio outfit," he told Scott. "We're gonna get legislation, we're gonna freeze it down...they don't get any more money."

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

Re: Juan Williams' (NPR) Firing Causing Conservative Backlash

Juan williams = boring as fuck

 

[maxiep]

http://www.aolnews.com/opinion/arti...iams-npr-and-the-death-of-liberalism/19683488

 

[BLAZER PROPHET]

Re: Juan Williams' (NPR) Firing Causing Conservative Backlash

Like barfo said, I don't get it. I like Williams and thought he played the role of moderate very well.

 

[maxiep]

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/10/21/huckabee-calls-on-congress-to-cut-npr-funding/

I wonder if it isn't time to completely sever the umbilical cord from the government and NPR.

 

[mook]

They only get about 2% of their funding from the federal government, so they might as well cut that purse string. NPR is a fantastic service and would be just fine without the backing. My only concern is that there'd be a risk of it becoming a much more left wing propaganda machine (like all of AM talk radio is for the right). But even that is doubtful. They raise a lot of money with moderate and conservative Americans.

I don't think anything O'Reilly or anybody else on the right says really matters. It's patently obvious what they'd say. What does matter is that a lot of people in the middle and on the left are really puzzled by the decision.

I wouldn't consider cutting off my annual donation over this move. I mean, do I really want to give up great programs like Wait Wait Don't Tell Me and Science Friday over one bad decision?

maxie, I strongly suggest you reconsider. Frankly, a boycott is probably meaningless to them. I'm planning on shaving off 10% of my donation and explicitly explaining to the person I call into why I am doing so. If they hear it enough at the bottom of the organization, it might register at the top.

 

[BGrantFan]

They only get about 2% of their funding from the federal government, so they might as well cut that purse string. NPR is a fantastic service and would be just fine without the backing.

Isn't NPR (and its associated stations) tax-exempt because of that funding?

Also, while "NPR" may receive a fraction of its budget from federal funding, their local affiliate stations receive much, much more.

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which covers both radio and television, gets $90 million per year in federal funding that goes to member public radio stations, not NPR itself. (This would be your local NPR affiliate.) She said any money NPR gets from the CPB comes via grants it has to apply for, and those grants only make up a tiny percentage of the overall NPR budget, which Schiller puts at $160 million per year.

(Looking at CPB's financials - page 17 specifically -- it appears the group got a $422 million total allocation from the federal government in FY2010, of which roughly $93 million went to radio.)


"NPR gets no allocation from CPB," Schiller said. "Zero. We are a private 501(c)3. We've had journalists call up and ask what department of the government we report to. That's laughable."


There appears to be something of a hole in her argument, however: If the CPB sends most of its radio money to member stations, and the member stations pay dues to NPR, doesn't NPR still end up getting taxpayer money via member stations, in addition to the one to three percent it gets via grants?

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20020383-503544.html

Indirectly or directly, NPR is benefitting greatly from federal tax dollars. What good is a radio network if it has no stations to air its programming, and if the dues those stations pay NPR come from federal tax dollars? I say pull the $93 million for local stations and let NPR make up the rest in donations or advertising, like other partisan networks do.

 

[BGrantFan]

I became interested in how many NPR affiliates there are. Looks like the number is ~700.

http://www.cpb.org/aboutpb/faq/stations.html

$93,000,000/700 stations = ~$132,850/station

Considering that most of these affiliates merely run the national NPR programming, which means they typically don't pay for their own talent, that's a fair chunk of money for basically plugging in a cord and paying some bills.

 

[Denny Crane]

Re: Ridiculous

Cut the federal budget by ending the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, or at least stop using public money to fund it.

I see a few agree with this.

 

[agoo]

What NPR program was this guy on? I have NPR on in my car constantly and have for a few years now and cannot remember his name.

 

[HailBlazers]

What NPR program was this guy on? I have NPR on in my car constantly and have for a few years now and cannot remember his name.

He was a really good political commentator on morning edition and such. Bad move by NPR, he fit really good with their program's

That being said, I agree NPR is not unbiased, but I wouldn't go as far as to say shut down the public funding of it. Were Never going to get unfiltered news in this country, but NPR is pretty good at giving a baseline of information that the listener can interpret on their own.

I applaud Juan for pointing out that the "PC" shit is outta hand in this country, people care more about being PC than actually making progress on social issues.