Of Juan Williams & the Imminent Defunding of NPR
There is really not much more I can say about the Juan Williams kerfuffle that has not been said on some blog, editorial page or newscast. The management of NPR look like narrow-minded fools, exposed now in the public square for what conservatives have long held them to be: partisans of the Democratic Party and its liberal agenda, elitists who reserve a special (intense) animus for FoxNews.
“No conservatives,” law professor William A. Jacobson writes, “are trying to prevent people from appearing on NPR, but liberal interest groups and their media outlets are trying to prevent people from appearing on Fox News.” It wasn’t Williams’ recent statement that offended them so much as the fact that he made it on FoxNews.
Well, Greg Gutfield has a slightly different view, “Let’s face it: they didn’t fire Juan Williams for expressing an independent opinion, they fired Juan Williams for expressing an independent opinion that didn’t jibe with theirs.” If it were “controversial” statements that so offended them, they would long since have fired the former Mrs. Floyd Haskell, widow to the late liberal Democratic Senator from Colorado. The one-time Mrs. Haskell (no relation to Eddie) has expressed some rather controversial opinions. Fortunately, for her, she just didn’t express them on FoxNews.
But, then again, Mrs. Haskell’s opinions tend to be in line with approved discourse for the smart set in our nation’s capital while Mr. Williams’ comments were, well, as Sonicfrog suggests, politically incorrect:
I’m just amazed that these supposedly smart people didn’t have the foresight to take the topic that Juan Williams presented, the natural human condition of having irrational fears, and discussing the topic and ways of dealing with and conquering them. But Noooooo, they were just so stupidly politically correct that they let a wonderful journalistic opportunity go to waste, and fired Williams instead.
The good news is now that the narrow-mindedness of NPR is now on people’s radar screens, the network will likely soon lose its public funding, especially if Republicans prevail in this fall’s elections. And just like their hated rival FoxNews, NPR will have to compete for survival in the private marketplace.
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NPR listeners objected to Juan Williams expressing his views on FoxNews. FoxNews viewers had no objection to Juan Williams expressing his views on NPR.
Inescapable conclusion: FoxNews viewers are more open-minded than NPR listeners.
Comment by V the K — October 22, 2010 @ 11:19 pm - October 22, 2010
BTW: Newsweek says that Democrats are “fired up” and surging. But, considering Newsweek was recently sold for the price of a Dollar Menu Item at McDonald’s (and I don’t mean an issue of the magazine, I mean their entire publishing operation), I don’t think their opinion is especially reliable.
Comment by V the K — October 22, 2010 @ 11:34 pm - October 22, 2010
I think I saw, this morning, that NPR has only gotten $4 million of government funding in the last 10 years, but still it’s $4 million than they should have gotten or deserved.
Comment by ThatGayConservative — October 23, 2010 @ 12:23 am - October 23, 2010
The elephant in the room:
What the frost is a publicly-funded broadcast corporation- or ANY broadcast corporation, come to think about it- think it’s doing by enforcing an unwritten political-speech ban on its employees?!
Comment by DaveP. — October 23, 2010 @ 12:41 am - October 23, 2010
NPR is a joke who take themselves too seriously that they cannot even see their own inherent liberal bias. Fresh Air is Stale Air while host Terry Gross is the utlimate Leftist stooge.
I have this skit about NPR called Pretentious Sh&% as they all have very unusual guests for their show. Most notably, they perform a seance to contact the ghosts of Joseph Stalin, Karl Marx, Lenin, & other Communists. The problem arises when they have an unexpected guest in the form of the ghost of Adoplh Hitler. Terry Gross interviews them all with her stale, dry questions as the ghosts become more like poltergeists. Gross loses control of the interview when Hitler deems she must be sent to the Concentration Camps…
Comment by Sebastian Shaw — October 23, 2010 @ 9:44 am - October 23, 2010
NP(S)R… National Socialist Public Radio.
I’ve often seen our lefty friends often misunderstand censorship. Kicking an idiot out of your house isn’t censorship; the idiot can say all they want, in their own house. No one must ever be obligated to provide a platform for another.
Except when it’s the government doing the kicking. It’s censorship when the government does it. Or when it’s the taxpayers providing the platform. It is censorship when a “public corporation” does it, that is funded by the taxpayers.
So, our lefty friends should be outraged here. “Should be.”
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — October 23, 2010 @ 11:04 am - October 23, 2010
Sorry, N(S)PR. – too early in the morning.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — October 23, 2010 @ 11:05 am - October 23, 2010
As much as I want to see them defunded – won’t happen. Sorry the last mouthpiece of the white elite urbanite isn’t going anywhere.
Comment by Leah — October 23, 2010 @ 11:08 am - October 23, 2010
Leah: Just picture a GOP-sponsored line-item veto… in the hands of President Palin.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — October 23, 2010 @ 11:35 am - October 23, 2010
Juan Williams’s firing may also be seen as a warning to other African-Americans who might be tempted to consort with conservatives… sort of the white progressive equivalent of chopping a slaves foot off to keep him on the plantation.
Comment by V the K — October 23, 2010 @ 1:48 pm - October 23, 2010
I’d like to offer some food for thought. I think we should be clear about who – or what organization – the cries for defunding are talking about. “Public Broadcasting” has been a favorite punching bag of conservatives for years. And perhaps not without cause. That point I don’t disagree with.
But NPR is not a public corporation, or even public broadcasting. It receives no direct funding from the government. NPR is an independent 501(c)3 non-profit corporation. It was has been for years. Yes, it grew out of the Corp. for Public Broadcasting, but it is no longer public.
NPR funding comes from a variety of source; less than 50% is sourced from public radio stations for licensing of NPR programming. Of that 50%, some is federal money that the stations receive, which varies in percentage by station. This is all information which is available from NPR’s tax filings.
NPR – as a brand, and as a non-profit company, actually does exist in a competitive marketplace. It just happens to be non-profit competition, with other entities such as American Public Media and Public Radio International. For example, my local station – WHYY – carries the BBC World Service News Hour.
Defunding public radio will have little impact on NPR and it’s flagship shows, like Morning Edition and Car Talk. What it will do is sound the death knell for public radio stations in rural markets that receive a significant percentage of their operating funds from the government. And maybe that’s acceptable, depending on one’s opinion.
From a conservative viewpoint, I can completely understand the desire to eliminate public radio funding as an unnecessary government expenditure. But it’s not even close to accurate to claim that taxpayers are supporting liberal speech, when NPR derives most of it’s funding from donations, endowments, and sponsorships.
Comment by Neptune — October 23, 2010 @ 4:13 pm - October 23, 2010
Given that donations to public radio are tax deductible, they are funded more than a little bit by the tax-dollars-not-collected (or, as a liberal would describe it, “cost to the government”).
If George Soros donated $1.8 million that would have been taxable, then The Government was deprived of well over half a million dollars of revenue. That ain’t peanuts (and look what he bought with his 1.8!!).
What would any news broadcaster give to be a 501(c)3 corporation?! Why should the propaganda arm of the Democrat party be given the benefits and prestige of such a designation? The same reason ACORN received millions from the Feds, I’ll wager: “Because we can–and you hate poor people if you say otherwise.”
Comment by Polly — October 23, 2010 @ 5:50 pm - October 23, 2010
Oh yeah, I read something yesterday that described PBS as “a genteel and insular organization.” SHEESH!!!! Tell THAT to Juan Williams!
Comment by Polly — October 23, 2010 @ 5:52 pm - October 23, 2010
So they launder the money through the stations, first? And that makes it OK? Sorry, I don’t think that makes it OK. My position is unchanged.
Good. Not that I want to pick on rural areas, but there are lots and lots of things that government has no business funding. We should cut them all, now.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — October 23, 2010 @ 5:58 pm - October 23, 2010
According to the guys at NewsBusters (not a primary source of course, but I’m too lazy/hurried right now to go to primary sources):
So again: Instead of N(S)PR getting federal money, it goes to CPB who then gives it to N(S)PR. Big deal. Let’s cut all federal funding for CPB, then.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — October 23, 2010 @ 6:15 pm - October 23, 2010
NPR… receives no direct funding from the government…
Then, why would they miss it if we cut it?
Comment by V the K — October 23, 2010 @ 7:40 pm - October 23, 2010
ILC, I don’t know where NewsBusters gets their information, so I can’t comment on it. But I can tell you that the numbers I provided above came directly from the source – NPR’s financial disclosures, which are available on their website (including IRS filings). You can call it laundering through the stations first, but it’s not really – the stations which receive grants from CPB are under no obligation to buy programming from NPR, or any other Public Radio provider for that matter.
VtheK, what organization wouldn’t miss some of it’s funding, from any source? Like any other organization, NPR would adjust though.
My larger point (which admittedly I let get lost in my own comment above
) is that how NPR and other Public Radio organizations are actually structured and funded is poorly understood by most people in the blogosphere (and especially those on TV) calling for it’s defunding. The message of the calls for defunding is that public radio wouldn’t exist without taxpayer dollars (and less explicitly in some cases, that it shouldn’t), but it would. I am less bothered by folks on blogs calling for it, since many take the time to put some thought into their arguments. I get frustrated when it’s Senators and Reps doing it though, since I have zero faith in any of them to actually understand the facts, when they can instead use a camera in front of them to score political points. Because it’s in their DNA, whichever party they’re in.
Now that all being said, I completely understand the conservative viewpoint that we shouldn’t fund it at all, even if I may personally disagree. The firing of Williams is really inexcusable. NPR as an organization needs a serious leadership re-evaluation and shake-up. It’s good to see people letting NPR know they screwed this up big-time.
Comment by Neptune — October 24, 2010 @ 12:28 am - October 24, 2010
What NPR should lose is it’s non-profit status. If they are going to continue to so blatantly promote the agenda of one political party over the other then they should be relieved of their 501(c)3 status post haste. They should have to hack it in the broadcast wilderness just like every other radio station and see how many donations they get when they can’t be written off on people’s taxes any longer.
Comment by Kristie — October 24, 2010 @ 2:15 am - October 24, 2010
We have how many radio and television stations/channels/streams?
We need government funding for NPR and PBS because……….?
If we can’t clear up this budget wart, there is no use talking about cutting government spending.
Tell me again why millions have to be spent on billboards announcing the coming spending of more millions on fixing the bridge ahead.
Comment by Heliotrope — October 25, 2010 @ 10:21 am - October 25, 2010
Neptune, welcome to a comment section that is, sometimes, so ironic and hypocritical, the commenters fail to grasp the irony of their anger and outrage.
Yes, NPR needs a shakeup in its leadership. Yes, NPR did screw up. Yes, calls for defunding the group may be ineffective and wrong-headed, but the calls for defunding are probably more intended to bring about the shake-up of NPR and might cause NPR to trench-back a bit. I remember when Sen Jesse Helms was a’screamin about the liberals at NPR, PBS, CPB, NEA, NEH et al… a few of those groups started funding center-right contributors and projects… for a short, short while. It was a long-needed debate… only the MSM belittled it all. And the impact wasn’t lasting.
The broader issue is to underscore the intolerance of the liberals. This Juan Williams firing does it perfectly. But it shouldn’t be the focus.
We shouldn’t be pressing for a defunding of NPR –or as some like to ridiculously claim, Natl Socialist Public Radio– we really should be pressing for the end to tax-exemptions for all contributions to charities. Period. Religious & political organizations, included.
Let’s hear about ending tax exemptions for charitable contributions… afterall, the firing of Juan Williams seems to suggest that Geo Soros wasn’t motivated by charity in giving away $1.8m to NPR… he wanted to strike out at those who legitimize his arch-nemesis and loudest critic, Fox News.
Comment by Michigan-Matt — October 25, 2010 @ 10:52 am - October 25, 2010
Neptune: We can agree to disagree. My bottom line is that I see no valid need for – and frankly, no constitutionality in – the Federal government providing subsidies to broadcasters or other media.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — October 25, 2010 @ 12:09 pm - October 25, 2010
Another fine point. But possibly a tougher sell, as one of the major parties benefits from N(S)PR bias and will therefore refuse to admit the bias exists.
Comment by ILoveCapitalism — October 25, 2010 @ 12:13 pm - October 25, 2010
BTW, I don’t know if anyone watched The Daily Show on Monday night, but Stewart’s skewering of NPR was hilarious. And of course well-deserved. One of their funniest bits lately.
Comment by Neptune — October 26, 2010 @ 4:37 pm - October 26, 2010