NPR Fires Liberal News Analyst For Non-PC Nervousness

[bfdd]

Craig, what the fuck are you talking about? Just because I have the ability to see "right" and "left" leaning bias doesn't make it some mystical super power that doesn't exist. It just means your head is so far up your ass that you're blinded by your own ideological bullshit.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Why yes, because Totenberg regularly violates the rules for employees. Her frequent guest spots on Fox (or Mike Malloy) continue unpunished!

You're irrational. That's clearer and clearer with each post.



No. But I notice that there are fewer defenders of Obama on the Patriot Act needing responses correcting them here than there are needing correction on Williams.

Your posts in this thread are basically despicable - false, ignorant, defending wrong.

We know how you roll. If I hadn't some respect for NPR I wouldn't have donated to them in the past, and probably more than you.

One of my chief complaints about the republicans was the deafening silence which came after it was clear that Bush got just about everything wrong. Now obama one-ups 43. What are we hearing from the then outraged? "Well the republicans". Now THAT'S despicable.

 

[theeedude]

He went on TV and said Muslims make him nervous. I don't see how he can be considered objective with that said. If he went on TV and said white people give him the creeps, the same crew bashing NPR for firing him now would be bashing them for not firing him.

 

[Craig234]

We know how you roll. If I hadn't some respect for NPR I wouldn't have donated to them in the past, and probably more than you.

One of my chief complaints about the republicans was the deafening silence which came after it was clear that Bush got just about everything wrong. Now obama one-ups 43. What are we hearing from the then outraged? "Well the republicans". Now THAT'S despicable.

I thought you had posted something that wasn't you - and realizing you hadn't, toned down my comments. I stick by the irrationality.

The fact that you abandon all of NPR without any real understanding of why they did what they did here, and trashing this important service, says a lot more than the donations.

If you were donating $500 to them, you have donated more than I have; I like NPR and support them politically, but I have others I support more than the 'neutral' NPR.

There are important messages to counter the right's propaganda machine done better by others that our society needs more than the quality product of NPR.

As I think I posted, you are reminding me of the fair-weather friends of the ACLU.

'Sure, we're big advocates of civil rights - but not when they do something that pisses us off in our bias'. I don't see much reason to expect you to learn why they did this.

You have ignored many posts with some of the information explaining it, of years of history and violation of rules, and don't seem to have heard one word.

 

[Craig234]

He went on TV and said Muslims make him nervous. I don't see how he can be considered objective with that said. If he went on TV and said white people give him the creeps, the same crew bashing NPR for firing him now would be bashing them for not firing him.

I think if that's all there was, then given his other comments not to blame all Muslims for 9/11 (Muslims were the actual target), I think this could have been dealt with differently.

Discussing the fact that many people do have those reactions is a legitimate discussion for people to have - in the right context.

To compare it to the Sherrod firing, that was her using a statement of bad feelings to whites she'd had in a larger message against bigotry.

Had she JUST said she has bad feelings to whites, it's a scandal for her as a public official. But her saying it as something she'd done wrong (in the private sector) is different.

Of course, it's too bad the source on the right, on Breitbart, lied about what she said.

I'd like to give the right credit for recognizing that, they deserve a little for accepting the correction, but they had little bad to say of Breitbart, and attacked Obama mostly.

 

[Lemon law]

Craig, what the fuck are you talking about? Just because I have the ability to see "right" and "left" leaning bias doesn't make it some mystical super power that doesn't exist. It just means your head is so far up your ass that you're blinded by your own ideological bullshit.

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Funny thing bfdd, I very much doubt your self proclaimed ability to see your own biases, and I have always associated the forum name of bfdd with an almost uncurable case of anal cranial inversion.

But cheer up, you probaly think the same of me, so I will wait for events to prove you wrong.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

When I have access to a computer I'll give my analysis of the situation which includes Williams, but don't worry Craig, I'm not going to abandon them but yes I'm passing on this cycle as a protest.

 

[halik]

You should be proud of NPR for its standards. Williams had a history of violating their rules, such as by appearing on 'punditry' shows with more opinion than fact. There was also the issue that after Bush refused any interview by NPR - while granting them to the other networks - except one, where they named the interview, they'd only accept Juan Williams, NPR refused because they were not willing to allow the White House to select the interviewer - and the Fox promptly had Williams do the interview for them.

The result was considered a journalistic farce, where Williams was more 'worshipping' the President than asking any harder questions. This did not help his journalistic credibility.

Check Williams on www.mediamatters.com, this goes back years.

You clearly haven't checked into the reasons for NPR doing this, by citing just the one comment that 'broke the camel's back'.

You quote media matters to support your point? Their own mission statement describes them as "progressive".

I have a huge issue with the notion that NPR is or should be a left-leaning journalistic organization as characterized by the islamic counsel head. It's a government-sponsored organization and as such they should have no inherent bias either way.

 

[her209]

You quote media matters to support your point? Their own mission statement describes them as "progressive".

I have a huge issue with the notion that NPR is or should be a left-leaning journalistic organization as characterized by the islamic counsel head. It's a government-sponsored organization and as such they should have no inherent bias either way.

Congress is a government-sponsored organization.

 

[Craig234]

You quote media matters to support your point? Their own mission statement describes them as "progressive".

Uh, ya? And what? They're accurate. You're an ideologue to think that's a bad thing.

Progressive doesn't mean "we lie about the right to win points against them", contrary to your delusion. The Holocaust Museum supports the Jewish perspective on the Holocaust - does that mean the Holocaust didn't happen because they say it did? The Cancer Society is biased against cancer - so it invents facts?

Amnesty International is against human rights abuses - does that mean you can't listen to a word they say about abuses, they make them up in order to further some agenda they have to claim all kinds of abuses that don't exist? You seem to think all organizations are like Fox News, propaganda.

Organizations with a view on an issue can be dedicated to spreading the truth about the issue, not lying about the issue.

For Media Matters, that's the recognition that there is a major right-wing media presence which is a propaganda organization, putting out lies that are grown in the labs at right-wing think tanks, distributed in right-wing media, and they expose the lies, factually, you can judge their accuracy (in theory - though you can't).

I have a huge issue with the notion that NPR is or should be a left-leaning journalistic organization as characterized by the islamic counsel head. It's a government-sponsored organization and as such they should have no inherent bias either way.

Yup, someone has an opinion that they lean left, and that's a 'huge issue'.

As I said before, people who are biased - like you - will see bias anywhere. If NPR does an accurate story on some aspect of poverty - why, that's liberal bias.

 

[bamacre]

NPR claims only 2% of their funding is from the federal government. So, the term "government-sponsored organization" isn't very accurate.

Regardless, NPR should be able to hire and fire whoever and whenever they please, and without a need for reason. I would also support cutting them off that 2%. It shouldn't be needed.

 

[DesiPower]

I read this today. Terrible. He was just speaking about dealing with his fears. He is a real standup guy. But in America today, you better not say anything against muslims or gays. I am not talking about listening to or giving audience to trash like West Boro baptist church, but you can't even have legitimate dialogue. He'll get another job, its really NPR's loss.

Seems Blank dont enjoy the same minority status anymore... but the Kooly liberals the gays and Muslims are the new blacks... the ppl are just minority addicts.

 

[shira]

Here's an example of the history with Williams - from an article Feb 2009: http://mediamatters.org/blog/200902130007

Isn't Juan Williams violating NPR's code of ethics?

February 13, 2009 11:28 am ET by Eric Boehlert

As CF highlighted yesterday, NPR management has finally taken steps to stem the damage that NPR's Juan Williams routinely does with his appearances on Fox News. NPR's ombudsman Alicia Shepard wrote:

In the end, NPR must decide -- as it apparently already has -- whether giving its listeners the benefit of Williams' voice is worth the cost of annoying some listeners for his work on Fox. As a result of this latest flap, NPR's Vice President of News, Ellen Weiss, has asked Williams to ask that Fox remove his NPR identification whenever he is on O'Reilly.

Frankly, that's not enough and here's why. As I noted back in 2007, when Williams again embarrassed NPR via his conduct on Fox News, and specifically, on an appearance he made on The O'Reilly Factor:

Real damage is being done to NPR by having its name, via Williams, associated with Fox News' most opinionated talker. In fact, Williams' recent appearance on The O'Reilly Factor almost certainly violated NPR's employee standards, which prohibit staffers from appearing on programs that "encourage punditry and speculation rather than fact-based analysis" and are "harmful to the reputation of NPR."

To add fuller context, the NPR code of ethics clearly states:

9. NPR journalists must get permission from the Vice President for their Division or their designee to appear on TV or other media. It is not necessary to get permission in each instance when the employee is a regular participant on an approved show. Permission for such appearances may be revoked if NPR determines such appearances are harmful to the reputation of NPR or the NPR participant.

10. In appearing on TV or other media including electronic Web-based forums, NPR journalists should not express views they would not air in their role as an NPR journalist. They should not participate in shows electronic forums, or blogs that encourage punditry and speculation rather than rather than fact-based analysis.

Yet here it is in 2009 and NPR finds itself answering angry listener emails because Williams said something stupid on The O'Reilly Factor; something I cannot imagine Williams would ever say on an NPR program. Isn't Williams clearly violating NPR's own standards by appearing on that program; a program that quite obviously encourages "punditry and speculation rather than fact-based analysis" and more importantly is "harmful to the reputation of NPR"? (If the show is not harmful to NPR's reputation than why don't more NPR staffers appear on it?)

Or put another way, how is Williams not violating the code of ethics by appearing on The O'Reilly Factor? And yes, I read the part where Shepard noted Williams is no longer on-staff and that he's paid by NPR to be an independent contractor:

Last spring, NPR's management put him on contract with the title "news analyst" largely to give him more latitude about what he says.

She later added:

[NPR managers] are in a bind because Williams is no longer a staff employee but an independent contractor. As a contract news analyst, NPR doesn't exercise control over what Williams says outside of NPR.

But here's how NPR's code of ethics defines who is covered by its rules:

This code covers all NPR journalists - which for the purposes of this code includes all persons functioning in the News, Programming and Online Divisions as reporters, hosts, newscasters, writers, editors, directors, photographers and producers of news, music or other NPR programming. It also covers all senior News, Programming and Online content managers. It does not cover administrative or technical staff from News, Programming or Online. The code also applies to material provided to NPR by independent producers, member station contributors and/or reporters and freelance reporters, writers, news contributors or photographers.

And what if a non-staff contributor violates the code of ethics? NPR has the option of simply stop using that person in the future:

Because contributors in this category are not NPR employees, the remedy for dealing with a conflict of interest or other violation of the principles of this code is rejection of the offered material.

According to the NPR standards, written to "to protect the credibility of NPR's programming by ensuring high standards of honesty, integrity, impartiality and staff conduct," there are three relevant guidelines that, in this situation, seem to apply to Williams:

1. Don't appear on programs that promote punditry.

2. Don't appear on programs that are harmful to NPR's reputation.

3. Don't say things on non-NPR programs that the journalist would not say on NPR.

It seems that NPR either needs to rewrite its standards, or it needs to take more forceful action regarding Williams' appearances on The O'Reilly Factor.

I think this pretty clearly shows that NPR had an explicit policy in place about the propriety of their reporters engaging in personal commentary on other news/opinion outlets. And it's clear that Williams was in violation of these rules. I venture to guess that if NPR had fired one of their reporters for making a LEFT-wing statement on, say, CNN (for example, saying something like, "The seething rage of many members of the Tea Party makes me very nervous; what kind of intelligent decisons can anyone make when the world is viewed through a red haze? Of course, I fully support the rights of Tea Partyers to be angry."), we wouldn't have heard a word of protest from ATPN conservatives (and, in fact, they'd probably protest if the firing didn't occur fast enough).

Par for the course on ATPN, I'm afraid.

 

[DesiPower]

NPR claims only 2% of their funding is from the federal government. So, the term "government-sponsored organization" isn't very accurate.

Regardless, NPR should be able to hire and fire whoever and whenever they please, and without a need for reason. I would also support cutting them off that 2%. It shouldn't be needed.

Yes, they are a private organization, but they still fall under the same labor laws. Being a ultra liberal far left media with reporters like Nina Totenberg and being funded by minority whores like George Soros does not allow them to break labor laws. If Juan wants he can easily file a suite and win.

 

[DesiPower]

I think this pretty clearly shows that NPR had an explicit policy in place about the propriety of their reporters engaging in personal commentary on other news/opinion outlets. And it's clear that Williams was in violation of these rules. I venture to guess that if NPR had fired one of their reporters for making a LEFT-wing statement on, say, CNN (for example, saying something like, "The seething rage of many members of the Tea Party makes me very nervous; what kind of intelligent decisons can anyone make when the world is viewed through a red haze? Of course, I fully support the rights of Tea Partyers to be angry."), we wouldn't have heard a word of protest from ATPN conservatives (and, in fact, they'd probably protest if the firing didn't occur fast enough).

Par for the course on ATPN, I'm afraid.

Jaun has been doing that more than 2 years, so leaglly, NPR lost the right to fire him on that basis for a long time. This move was clearly pushed by George Soros and Muslim organizations

 

[Craig234]

NPR claims only 2% of their funding is from the federal government. So, the term "government-sponsored organization" isn't very accurate.

You think the facts matter to these right-wing people. Cute.

When I get past the outright falsehoods, I'll get to where they're only 98% wrong.

Regardless, NPR should be able to hire and fire whoever and whenever they please, and without a need for reason. I would also support cutting them off that 2%. It shouldn't be needed.

No, they shouldn't, and this statement implies that's what they did here - an arbitrary act without any better reason that 'they felt like it'. Wrong.

I'm for increasing the 2% - we could use more quality programming in our society that, like the BBC, serves the public. I know, you would never have made a BBC, PBS or NPR.

As I've said on issue after issue, that's the difference, a misguided Libertarian ideology preventing good things versus Democrats actually doing good things.

Hell, you wouldn't have supported the law for cars to have seat belts, I presume. The free market will solve it - just ignore that it hadn't in 50 years, and that the government 'doing what's right' in requiring them, and this action having the result of a major shift in public opinion to greatly increase support for seat belts to where there IS a demand for them now, had the positive result. But short-sighted Libertarians think it magically happens - ignorance that's dangerous as they'd block good program after good program for ideology.

There's no middle for them, it seems, between the government 'knowing what's best' on one issue, and a super-sized USSR tyranny. So they support a disastrous wasteland.

 

[Craig234]

Seems Blank dont enjoy the same minority status anymore... but the Kooly liberals the gays and Muslims are the new blacks... the ppl are just minority addicts.

LOL, once again a righty proves my point well. 'They want EQUALITY - that's UNFAIR to us!'

 

[bamacre]

No, they shouldn't, and this statement implies that's what they did here - an arbitrary act without any better reason that 'they felt like it'. Wrong.

I'm for increasing the 2% - we could use more quality programming in our society that, like the BBC, serves the public. I know, you would never have made a BBC, PBS or NPR.

As I've said on issue after issue, that's the difference, a misguided Libertarian ideology preventing good things versus Democrats actually doing good things.

Hell, you wouldn't have supported the law for cars to have seat belts, I presume. The free market will solve it - just ignore that it hadn't in 50 years, and that the government 'doing what's right' in requiring them, and this action having the result of a major shift in public opinion to greatly increase support for seat belts to where there IS a demand for them now, had the positive result. But short-sighted Libertarians think it magically happens - ignorance that's dangerous as they'd block good program after good program for ideology.

There's no middle for them, it seems, between the government 'knowing what's best' on one issue, and a super-sized USSR tyranny. So they support a disastrous wasteland.

We're not going to agree here because I actually support the idea of private property rights, and of course you do not. The ends don't usually justify the means, especially in areas where we tend to disagree.

Sure you'd increase NPR's federal funding. Where you gonna get the money to do it? Someone else of course. If you want NPR to have more funds, get the money from your own wallet. And if that's not enough, tough titty.

 

[CitizenKain]

Jaun has been doing that more than 2 years, so leaglly, NPR lost the right to fire him on that basis for a long time. This move was clearly pushed by George Soros and Muslim organizations

George Soros, the boogey man of the uneducated masses.

 

[Analogsoul]

Jaun has been doing that more than 2 years, so leaglly, NPR lost the right to fire him on that basis for a long time. This move was clearly pushed by George Soros and Muslim organizations

I didn't realize there are statute of limitations when it comes to enforcing a policy. NPR did warn Williams several times that he is in violation when he expresses his opinions on Fox. This is no different from any job where an employee doesn't follow company policy. First the employee gets warnings, then if the employee keeps violating the policy, he or she is fired.

 

[bfdd]

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Funny thing bfdd, I very much doubt your self proclaimed ability to see your own biases, and I have always associated the forum name of bfdd with an almost uncurable case of anal cranial inversion.

But cheer up, you probaly think the same of me, so I will wait for events to prove you wrong.

Lemon law, the difference is I know I'm bias and it has nothing to do with a "left" or "right" ideology like you and most others on these forums. I don't subscribe to a side because choosing sides is for losers.

 

[theeedude]

It's win win for everyone, NPR gets rid of a self-admittedly biased journalist and retains its reputation, Juan Williams become martyr of political correctness to the Fox News crowd and can now write a book to peddle to them about how he was oppressed at NPR.

 

[Throckmorton]

In light of the Mediamatters article explaining that he violated their code, it seems to me that they should have ended his contract a long time ago, for the reasons OTHER than what he said the other day.

 

[Throckmorton]

You think the facts matter to these right-wing people. Cute.

When I get past the outright falsehoods, I'll get to where they're only 98% wrong.



No, they shouldn't, and this statement implies that's what they did here - an arbitrary act without any better reason that 'they felt like it'. Wrong.

I'm for increasing the 2% - we could use more quality programming in our society that, like the BBC, serves the public. I know, you would never have made a BBC, PBS or NPR.

As I've said on issue after issue, that's the difference, a misguided Libertarian ideology preventing good things versus Democrats actually doing good things.

Hell, you wouldn't have supported the law for cars to have seat belts, I presume. The free market will solve it - just ignore that it hadn't in 50 years, and that the government 'doing what's right' in requiring them, and this action having the result of a major shift in public opinion to greatly increase support for seat belts to where there IS a demand for them now, had the positive result. But short-sighted Libertarians think it magically happens - ignorance that's dangerous as they'd block good program after good program for ideology.

There's no middle for them, it seems, between the government 'knowing what's best' on one issue, and a super-sized USSR tyranny. So they support a disastrous wasteland.

I disagree. The 2% should end. It's a tiny slice of the total funding, yet it taints the entire network with the perception that it's run by the government.

For that reason, the British Foreign Office just ended funding of the World Service. It's now completely funded by the BBC which is funded by a fee that everybody pays.

 

[Craig234]

We're not going to agree here because I actually support the idea of private property rights, and of course you do not.

Statements about liberals by opponents here are wrong 95% of the time, and I can't remember the other 5%.

By your definitions above, the government having ANY tax means it 'does not support private property rights'.

Sure you'd increase NPR's federal funding. Where you gonna get the money to do it? Someone else of course. If you want NPR to have more funds, get the money from your own wallet. And if that's not enough, tough titty.

So, your commentary to the position of supporting more federal funding of something is, 'you would get the money from taxes'. I guess to you, that's a scathing indictment.

As I've said before, trying to have any discussion with such radical differences that one dollar in taxes is to you some horrific moral travesty, doesn't make much sense.

Some people just are just lacking the idea of 'community' in their politics.

That's normal, for after a healthy progressive movement has created a stable politician system for them - they forget the desperate problems it came out of.

At the same time our democracy is in great danger from the economic gutting of the middle class, removing much of its power, and the spread of right-wing ideology as the wealthy class returns to plutocracy, such as the new right for the monied to buy opinion in our political system, some recognize the threat, and others cheer it on.