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Do you check out your fellow travelers when you get onto any mode of public transportation? Especially anyone dressed in Islamist garb?
Liberal news analyst Juan Williams does and mentioned that he does in a discussion on the Bill O'Reilly show on Fox.
CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) National Executive Director Nihad Awad immediately contacted his employers at National Public Radio and said "NPR should address the fact that one of its news analysts seems to believe that all airline passengers who are perceived to be Muslim can legitimately be viewed as security threats."
NPR responded by firing Mr. Williams, after ten years employment, with a cell phone call.
Juan Williams may be a liberal but he is one of the most thoughtful commentators out there and a major national voice against all forms of bigotry.
It is a damn shame and the shame extends to NPR and CAIR, partners in suppressing legitimate expression of real concerns.
National Politically-Correct Radio Fires Juan Williams (VIDEO)
Liberal news analyst Juan Williams does and mentioned that he does in a discussion on the Bill O'Reilly show on Fox.
CAIR (Council on American-Islamic Relations) National Executive Director Nihad Awad immediately contacted his employers at National Public Radio and said "NPR should address the fact that one of its news analysts seems to believe that all airline passengers who are perceived to be Muslim can legitimately be viewed as security threats."
NPR responded by firing Mr. Williams, after ten years employment, with a cell phone call.
Juan Williams may be a liberal but he is one of the most thoughtful commentators out there and a major national voice against all forms of bigotry.
It is a damn shame and the shame extends to NPR and CAIR, partners in suppressing legitimate expression of real concerns.
National Politically-Correct Radio Fires Juan Williams (VIDEO)
NPR fires Juan Williams over anti-Muslim remarks
By Debbi Wilgoren and Paul Farhi
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, October 21, 2010; 12:31 PM
Veteran journalist Juan Williams was fired from his job as a senior news analyst for National Public Radio late Wednesday because of comments he made about Muslims and terrorism on "The O'Reilly Factor" on Fox News Channel.
NPR said in a statement that Williams's remarks - including that he gets "worried" and "nervous" when he sees people dressed in Muslim-style clothing on airplanes - "were inconsistent with our editorial standards and practices, and undermined his credibility as a news analyst with NPR."
Williams, 56, made the remarks Monday after the show's host, Bill O'Reilly, asked him whether he thought the United States was facing a "Muslim dilemma." O'Reilly said that "jihad, aided and abetted by some Muslim nations, is the biggest threat on the planet." Williams, who is African American and writes and speaks frequently on race, told O'Reilly that he agreed with his assessment.
"I mean, look, Bill, I'm not a bigot. You know the kind of books I've written about the civil rights movement in this country," he said. "But when I get on a plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they're identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."
Williams also brought up a statement made in a New York courtroom this month by Faisal Shahzad, the Pakistani American who pleaded guilty to trying to detonate a bomb in Times Square and was sentenced to life in prison.
"He said the war with Muslims, America's war is just beginning, first drop of blood. I don't think there's any way to get away from these facts," said Williams.
At the same time, Williams--who is also an analyst and commentator for Fox News--cautioned O'Reilly about making inflammatory statements, or defining all Muslims as posing a terror threat.
"We don't want, in America, people to have their rights violated, to be attacked on the street because they hear rhetoric from Bill O'Reilly and they act crazy," Williams said.
Williams said he agreed with critics who blasted O'Reilly for saying recently on the television show "The View" that "Muslims killed us on 9/11."
Extremists, not traditional Muslims, were responsible for those attacks, Williams said.
"View" co-host Whoopi Goldberg made the same point during O'Reilly's appearance on the show last week. But O'Reilly kept repeating the "Muslims killed us" statement, prompting Goldberg and co-host Joy Behar to stalk off the set in anger. O'Reilly said the role of Muslims in the 9/11 attacks is the reason he opposes a proposal to build a mosque in downtown Manhattan.
On Wednesday, as excerpts of Williams's remarks to O'Reilly circulated on the Internet, Muslim advocacy groups and liberal commentators called for his ouster. Conservative bloggers, in turn, said the firing of Williams amounted to political-correctness spiraling out of control.
Blogger Michelle Malkin, posting about the incident, said NPR had "caved into left-wing attack dogs on the Internet." And Erick Erickson, author of the "Red State" blog, called NPR's decision "disgusting."
" All Juan Williams did is say both exactly how he feels and how many, many other Americans feel on this subject," Erickson wrote. The man's body of work makes clear he is no bigot. But we sure can't offend muslims can we?"
But Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American Islamic relations, compared the ouster to radio shock jock Don Imus being fired for his "nappy-headed hos" comment, or people calling for Helen Thomas to lose her job after making anti-Israel remarks (Thomas, then 89 years old, abruptly retired).
"If you pay a professional price for those kinds of comments about other groups, it's only reasonable that you should do so when speaking about Muslims or Islam," Hooper said. He added, "How would [Williams] react if someone said the same thing about African Americans or another minority?"
Conservative politicians also weighed in, with Mike Huckabee and Sarah Palin calling Thursday for an investigation into the federal funding NPR receives, and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich demanding a Congressional probe.
"It's an act of total censorship...every listener of NPR should be outraged," Gingrich said. "What he said was very balanced. People should read what he had to say."
NPR is funded primarily by annual dues paid by its member stations, and by corporate sponsors and foundation grants. About 2 percent of its budget comes directly from federal tax money via funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the private organization set up by Congress to distribute federal funds to public radio and TV broadcasters. Its member stations receive public funding as well.
A former staff writer for The Washington Post, Williams still writes occasionally for the newspaper's opinion sections. In 1991, he was disciplined by the newspaper for making inappropriate comments to female staffers about their dating and sex lives. Those allegations, and the Post's internal investigation, were made public after Williams wrote in an opinion column that Anita Hill had "no credible evidence" for her allegations of sexual harassment by then-Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas.
Williams declined to comment to The Washington Post Thursday morning. But he will appear on "The O'Reilly Factor" for a one-on-one interview Thursday night, a spokeswoman for Fox said.
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