First interview with NPR CEO Vivian Schiller on Juan Williams firing
Call me lucky. I had a pre-scheduled interview this morning with NPR CEO Vivian Schiller this morning before her speech at the Atlanta Press Club Newsmakers luncheon at the 191 Club in downtown Atlanta.
So lo and behold, the entire Juan Williams firing blew up the past 24 hours. I happen to be the first person to talk to her about it. She basically said he was on NPR as a news analyst and wasn’t supposed to express opinions, something he had done time and time again on Fox News. This was just the final straw. Commentators, in contrast, are specifically called that on NPR and are supposed to be opinionated.
She said this has nothing to do with Fox News or his particular views of Muslims. She is also sorry NPR did this while most public radio stations (including WABE-FM) are in the middle of their fall pledge drives.
After the luncheon, John Weatherford, senior chief operating officer at WABE-FM, acknowledged the Williams flap has been a “distraction” for the pledge drive, and he has gotten many emails and calls from WABE listeners who won’t give money because of it. He also said today is the matching day for Atlanta Community Food Bank and he hopes it doesn’t hurt them.
[Williams himself spoke about the situation on Fox News today and said he couldn't believe he was let go without even a face-to-face conversation. He was terminated by phone.]
UPDATE@ 5:25 p.m. The Los Angeles Times reports that Fox has signed Williams to a new three-year contract worth nearly $2 million.
Here is part of the Q&A:
Q: Okay. What happened?
A: Let’s state a couple of facts. Juan is not an employee of NPR. He’s an independent contractor. He’s not NPR staff. He’s an NPR analyst. We have a contract with him for analyst opinions to provide news analysis. He is not a columnist or commentator. He also has an on-going relationship with Fox News. Mara Liasson is also on Fox News and is a full-time staffer. We accept that’s a whole other issue. However, we expect our journalists, whether they are news analysts or reporters to behave like journalists.
Q: So did Juan really get fired over just those Muslim comments? [He said he was uncomfortable with Muslims dressed in traditional garb on airplanes during a Fox News telecast yesterday.]
A: There have been several instances over the last couple of years where we have felt Juan has stepped over the line. He famously said last year something about Michelle Obama and Stokely Carmichael. [The quote on Fox News early last year: "Michelle Obama, you know, she's got this Stokely Carmichael in a designer dress thing going" and that she'll be an "albatross" for President Obama.]. This isn’t a case of one strike and you’re out.
Q: So this is obviously not an isolated incident.
A: There’s so much misinformation on the blogosphere, it’s nuts. This has been an on-going issue. [Here's NPR's ombudsman's piece on him last year after the Obama comment.] When he does that, when anybody does that, it undermines their credibility as a journalist or in Juan’s case, a news analyst for NPR. Those two things cannot go together.
Q: Have you done this before with other analysts or reporters?
A: It’s impossible to answer that. Every circumstance is different and would create false parallels.
Q: As you mentioned, Mara Liasson appears on Fox News. Is there an issue with Fox News?
A: No. She behaves on Fox as a journalists. I have no issues with anything she has said on Fox. This is not about Fox News. It’s not about a political agenda. This is not about even validating or invalidating [Williams'] feelings.
Q: Mike Huckabee is now saying NPR has discredited itself and should have federal funding revoked.
A: Yes, I heard that. This has become a political issue. My God, I’m shocked!
Q: Could NPR live without federal funding?
A: Let’s go on a sidebar. There’s a misperception about federal funding and public radio. There’s the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. They receive $90 million a year and a vast majority goes to member public radio stations. Those stations pull in more than $1 billion collectively a year. It’s significant and important but not even close to the lion’s share of revenues for public radio. NPR gets no allocation from CPB. 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. Have you listened to our shows? We do apply for competitive grants from the likes of the Ford Foundation and the Knight Foundation. As a result, some money from CPB does come to us when we win grants. Depending on the year, it represents just one to three percent of our total budget.
Q: What is your annual budget?
A: $160 million a year from station fees and dues, corporate underwriting, philanthropic contributions from individuals and corporation and earned income and earnings from our endowment.
Q: How healthy are you?
A: We had some issues the last couple of years and went into deficits. But we’ve regrouped and we’re back on track.
During the luncheon, she repeated much of what she told me.
“We are for civil liberties,” she said. “If you want to be a political activist, you may not also be a reporter or news analyst for NPR.”
Schiller also said it’s “sophomoric” to deride objectivity as a lie of omission, that hiding a journalists’ biases is a bad thing: “Yes, we are humans. We have opinions. None of us are impartial, that objectivity and absolute truth as concepts are unattainable. It does not follow that providing the most objective and most impartial work possible is not a worthy goal for professional journalists.”
She continues: “This is where the Juan Williams story enters. We have checks and balances to serve that goal. That’s why we have editors. We have an ombudsman and corrections. It’s why we let readers comment on stories. It’s why we run opinions and commentaries and label them as such. Commentaries are different from news analysis. It’s certainly why we practice journalism and prohibit journalists from certain activities, not just to protect the appearance of objectivity… it’s to protect the ideal of fair-minded journalism… People have strong opinions and professional journalists have developed procedures and standards and practices to counter them. It’s to draw a fine line between reporter and commentary and punditry.”
On a brighter note, she also noted that NPR public radio stations have seen their audience grow 60 percent over the past decade to 34 million people and that doesn’t include users who access NPR shows via mobile devices, the Web and podcasting. She is also proud that NPR has expanded its coverage in international news, the arts and sciences and other topics that have been reduced in other media.
“Our goal is simple,” Schiller told more the luncheon audience. “Deliver more news and information to more people in more ways.”
NOTE: I am a board member of the Atlanta Press Club.
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524 comments Add your comment
JTesla
October 21st, 2010
4:32 pm
Kevin, I do have to nit-pick on one statement:
“Isn’t it strange how religious beliefs have lead to more violence than all other beliefs combined”
You mean except for the belief that someone or some group needs more power? Religion may be the excuse, but power is the reason for the violence. Sorry, but the idea that religious beliefs have led to more wars or more violence gets thrown around as a truism, but it’s not really true. Without religion all that violence, and all the wars, they still would have occurred.
What's Important
October 21st, 2010
4:33 pm
Drew William, I have not heard anyone in the supposed “right wing media” call Bill Clinton or Barack Obama a murderer or a facist or a tryant. I have heard Bill Clinton called a liar and an adulterer and I have heard Mr. Obama referred to as a liberal and unqualified, but the last I heard truth was an absolute defense. Since neither you nor I can read all the tripe, and listen to all the garbage put out in blogs, in news media and on the airwaves, how about we keep the generalizations to a minium.
kevin
October 21st, 2010
4:33 pm
Adrienne King,
You realize that in the same breath you advocate banning burkas and women’s rights. So, you are for women’t rights so long as the clothing choice of the women represents a religion you disagree with. Well reasoned.
JTesla
October 21st, 2010
4:37 pm
boots: “most of the improvements in… treatment of women have come through Christians”
Interesting aside to the main topic: in most areas married Muslim woman could own their own separate property since the time before Mohammad (in other words it is an Arab tradition as it predates Islam). Women in England got the same right in 1870’s.
We’re not all that far removed from having fewer rights and fewer advances. Just saying.
Craig
October 21st, 2010
4:37 pm
Those that argue that 2% is all the government gives NPR – good, that’s 2% more that Soros has to give them! Schiller made a disparaging remark about Williams that he “[...] should have kept his feeling about Muslims between himself and “his psychiatrist or his publicist,” so accordingly she will be sued, and she should lose her job if the litmus test was created in the Williams’ case.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2010/10/21/130728202/npr-ceo-williams-views-of-muslims-should-stay-between-himself-and-his-psychiatrist
Karen
October 21st, 2010
4:38 pm
Vivian has decreed that you can only make fun of white men, Mormons, republicans, and tea party people. Oh, and Sarah Palin. NPR has been attacking her and her family personally without pause for 2 years.
NPR hates black men.
NoisyPiper
October 21st, 2010
4:38 pm
@JTesla:
The right wingers are hypocrites on this issue because it reflects precisely the Helen Thomas firing a few months back, and Fox News was one of the main proponents of her being fired. She was fired. Conservatives celebrated it.
Both Helen Thomas and Juan Williams made offensive statements. Both got fired for it. Conservatives only support one of those firings, and condemns the other. That is called hypocrisy.
kevin
October 21st, 2010
4:38 pm
JTesla,
Power is not a belief. As for the rest of your comment, I think that’s an extremely convenient, non-objective look at history.
Not My Real Name
October 21st, 2010
4:39 pm
“Casting aspersions” — What planet do you come from?
You can read right? You have a computer and the internet don’t you? There’s this thing called a search engine. Read or go warm up some milk and put on your jammies. It’s almost bedtime.
Is this the New America ?
October 21st, 2010
4:39 pm
@BW. Please forgive me but my medication has worn off. So, yes, I am under the illusion that I live in
a country that respects my GOD given rights stated in the Constitution. Are you suggesting, I should ask my doctor for a stronger dose of medication so I can snap out of it and face reality?
What's Important
October 21st, 2010
4:39 pm
You Distort/We Deride: Look, Fox news is one network. If ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, HLN and MSNBC, and yes NPR, cannot adequately counter what you say Fox is putting forth, then that’s your issue, not Fox’. While I agree that Fox does have a bias, so do all of the others, and there are many more of them out they, you are certainly adequately represented.
NJK
October 21st, 2010
4:42 pm
PUT NPR UP FOR SALE! No taxpayer funding should go to an organization who does not believe in the first amendment.
Cause I Care,
100% of the hijackers, men? How about Muslim men? They are not men of white European descent. You sound silly. We don’t want our taxpayer dollars going to this useless, needless radio station.
American Airlines Flight 11
Hijackers: Mohamed Atta (Egyptian), Waleed al-Shehri (Saudi Arabian), Wail al-Shehri (Saudi Arabian), Abdulaziz al-Omari (Saudi Arabian), Satam al-Suqami (Saudi Arabian)
American Airlines Flight 77
Hijackers: Hani Hanjour (Saudi Arabian), Khalid al-Mihdhar (Saudi Arabian), Majed Moqed (Saudi
Arabian), Nawaf al-Hazmi (Saudi Arabian), Salem al-Hazmi (Saudi Arabian).
United Airlines Flight 175
Hijackers: Marwan al-Shehhi (United Arab Emirati), Fayez Banihammad (United Arab Emirati), Mohand al-Shehri (Saudi Arabian), Hamza al-Ghamdi (Saudi Arabian), Ahmed al-Ghamdi (Saudi).
United Airlines Flight 93
Hijackers: Ziad Jarrah (Lebanese), Ahmed al-Haznawi (Saudi Arabian), Ahmed al-Nami (Saudi Arabian), Saeed al-Ghamdi (Saudi Arabian).
Fort Hood Shooter Nidal Malik Hasan
Shooter of two reservists in Arkansas Abdul Hakim Muhammad
And in case you were too young, Assassin of RFK Sirhan Sirhan. Barack Hussein Obama’s friend Bill Ayers dedicated his book to him. Isn’t he nice. And yes, they hated America back then too.
“An appeaser feeds the crocodiles, hoping it will eat him last.”
freespeechrules
October 21st, 2010
4:43 pm
@JTesla
You’re correct: “JTesla
October 21st, 2010
4:32 pm
Kevin, I do have to nit-pick on one statement:
“Isn’t it strange how religious beliefs have lead to more violence than all other beliefs combined”
You mean except for the belief that someone or some group needs more power? Religion may be the excuse, but power is the reason for the violence. Sorry, but the idea that religious beliefs have led to more wars or more violence gets thrown around as a truism, but it’s not really true. Without religion all that violence, and all the wars, they still would have occurred.”
@Kevin
I would have to have more faith in coming from an accident of nature than that I was created on purpose. I, nor you, are mutated amoebas nor monkeys. If you believe so, you have more faith than any preacher I know. It’s plain silliness.
kevin
October 21st, 2010
4:43 pm
Boots,
You say, “…Christianity v. Islam, but it wouldn’t be much of one, I promise. Let’s just say that most of the improvements in civil rights, medicine, education and treatment of women have come through Christians.”
You do not have any idea what you are talking about. I have read both the Koran and the Bible as well as the history of both religions. I have an MA in philosophy and minored in religion. You sound like you’ve had a Glenn Beck enema and like most Christians, seem to know very little about their own religion or the religion of others.
David
October 21st, 2010
4:43 pm
Vivian Schiller ” Williams’ Views Should Stay Between Himself And ‘His Psychiatrist’”, that was 100% worse than anything Juan Williams said, she basically insinuated that he had a psychiatric problem, it borders on defamation. It is defamation. Yet, as a Jew, she was able to back peddle. This goes back to what Rick Sanchez, the Jews own the media and their uncle or whoever is willing to forgive them when they say something even as out of line as this.
Joe american
October 21st, 2010
4:44 pm
This firing just proves NPR is nothing more than a fringe left wing progressive organization promoting an agenda that is destroying this country. I am sick and tired of not being able to criticize Muslims or being called racist if you oppose anything Obama proposes. I will actively fight to have all taxpayer funding for NPR to be eliminated. NPR has not integrity and serves no value.
Bubba the whitebread Cracker
October 21st, 2010
4:46 pm
NPR is a Joke. A bunch of Liberal Losers. I think Muslims in garb on a airplane would scare satan himself.
Bubba the whitebread Cracker
October 21st, 2010
4:46 pm
NPR is a Joke. A bunch of Liberal Losers. I think Muslims in garb on a airplane would scare satan himself.
kenlev
October 21st, 2010
4:46 pm
The Fox News channel is a political organization and not a news channel. If you go on these stations and make dumb comments you should be held responsible. It’s not a Liberal conspiracy, Rick Sanchez was fired from CNN for making the same dumb racial comments. I will be happy when O’Reilly, Beck, and the rest of these dummies are gone for preaching hate and intolerance. You Conservatives are so quick to jump on these blog sites and say such racist and disrespectful comments about minorities. Why don’t you try that freedom of speech on the street and get your a**es kicked. A bunch for B*%ches.
kevin
October 21st, 2010
4:47 pm
freespeechrules,
Do you also believe that women were made from a rib, a man lived in a fish, another man built a boat and collected 2 of every animal? Yeah, that’s not silly! You could swap the stories with in the bible with children’s stories and to someone whose never read both, he/ she would not know the difference.
It’s called science. You choose to believe some pre-scientific archaic attempt at describing the world, and I choose to believe things like evidence and science. To each his own.
freespeechrules
October 21st, 2010
4:47 pm
@NJK
Thank you for that information. Many do not know it. Muslims nor Christians are our only enemies.
@Is this the New America ?
lmao with you….good one
Drew Williams
October 21st, 2010
4:48 pm
@What’s Important No, we’re talking about “mainstream, Rush Limbaugh/Breitbart/Hannity stuff. You don’t recall when Limbaugh questioned on the airwaves whether or not Bill Clinton was personally involved in Vince Foster’s death? You don’t recall when Glenn Beck said Obama hates whites? You’ve forgotten when Sean Hannity claimed Obama was emulating Chairman Mao during the healthcare passage? If you can find anything even CLOSE to this on NPR, please, please, please and again, please provide it.
freespeechrules
October 21st, 2010
4:51 pm
@Kevin
You’re a bit backward, aren’t you? Science is proving those things now. Or, maybe you watch a different station than most and forget that scientific shows are on that are trying to prove/disprove these things? Public Television has shown many shows/documentaries that these things are either true or cannot be disproven by science,therfore remain a mystery and can be true. And, yes, I believe it fully.
Now, again, I ask that you get off this topic and back onto Juan, Fox News, NPR, Vivian, and stop fighting the Bible with me. Neither of us will “win” and we’re taking up valuable space for great comments on this issue.
What's Important
October 21st, 2010
4:52 pm
KenLev: You deride people for making racists remarks and then end your blog in such a mature way. Please tell me, do no minorities make racist remarks? Do no minorities make disrespectful comments about whites?
Larry Brown
October 21st, 2010
4:52 pm
Time for Juan to play the race card, unfortunately he has too much class for the drones at NPR. NPR CEO Vivian needs to see HER psychiatrist abour her denial issues. NPR is now nothing but old white women, was she jealous that his mustache is better than hers?
Big McLargeHuge
October 21st, 2010
4:54 pm
“Juan was simply voicing what most Americans feel when they see a Muslim…”
Who chose you to speak for “most” Americans? You certainly don’t speak for me, whoever you are.
freespeechrules
October 21st, 2010
4:55 pm
@Drew Williams
I remember those things. Proof would be great about NPR saying anything close to it.
Yet, Vivian was still wrong, in my opinion.
How many here have forgotten that Obama is half white and not full African? Why is he going by African-American? He’s either American or he isn’t, despite his color, creed, nationality….etc.
Drew Williams
October 21st, 2010
4:55 pm
@what’s important. The big questions is, what impact can a minority’s racist remarks make in a country run for the most part by white guys? It’s less the remarks and more the effect those remarks can make on an entire group of individuals.
DK
October 21st, 2010
4:56 pm
Ms Schiller is full of BS. I used to watch Fox News Sunday, as well as Special Report with Brit Hume. Mara Liasson has appeared on those shows many times and repeatedly expressed opinions. A journalists is defined as one who collects and disseminates information. Ms Schiller states that NPR expects their news analysts or reporters to behave like journalists. Going on TV and expressing opinions is not behaving like a journalist. Yet she doesn’t see Mara Liasson as violating this expectation of acting like a journalist. Both Maria and Juan are liberal and have expressed liberal opinions on many occasions with no repercussions from NPR. It is only when an opinion is voiced that doesn’t tow the liberal line does Ms Schiller see a violation of the contract. I don’t care if NPR fires a reporter for not towing the liberal line if they take no public money, but my research shows that they do, despite Ms. Schiller’s representation. NPR gets approximate 16% of its funding from the CPB. I have no problem with Fox firing someone for being too liberal as the difference between Fox and NPR is that Fox takes no public money. Let NPR live on private funds then the can hire and fire their journalists for any reason they choose (within legal bounds). Personally, I think it’s time to stop government funding of any radio or TV (except efforts like VOA or RFA that target foreign oppressed peoples). We have too much broadcasting now so government funding of such efforts is a waste of tax dollars.
Is this the New America ?
October 21st, 2010
4:56 pm
@ Noisy Piper. Your statements make it sound like this incident was “tit for tat.” Maybe everyone should just take all their marbles home and not play with each other anymore.
Mom Dukes
October 21st, 2010
4:56 pm
So let me get this straight…O’Reilly (Fox News) can openly protest the building of a mosque at Ground Zero but Williams (NPR contractor) gets fired for commenting that he is “uncomfortable with Muslims dressed in traditional garb on airplanes”. How ironic! Years ago I almost got off a plane because I saw a row of nuns praying before take off. The thoughts that entered my mind. So to Mr. Williams, I understand, nothing personal.
Things that make me uncomfortable… men in trench coats out of season, males between 15-40, standing in line at a bank, Park Atlanta, pit bulls on the loose, CVS, my water bill, religious and political zealots, someone videotaping me and it going viral…you get my drift? We live on a media diet of things that make us shudder but now we can’t even express that it make us “uncomfortable”…give me a break!
Juan Johnson
October 21st, 2010
4:56 pm
“Teacher Reader
October 21st, 2010
12:58 pm
Just called NPR radio to get my donation returned for their fall pledge drive. Juan Williams did not say anything that I myself think. He is the least liberal of the NPR reporters. A good reporter can have his opinions and put them aside when reporting facts. The current liberal media is unable to that. Their beliefs and what they report mesh and blur together.”
Not only will I donate in your place, I will also submit an employment application to FAUX News for the erstwhile Juan Williams. This trend of “saying what I want to just because” has got to stop. Where has civility gone?
Drew Williams
October 21st, 2010
4:58 pm
With NPR, you won’t find the proof because it’s simply not modeled on the “anything-goes-morning-zoo” format of right-wing talk.
kevin
October 21st, 2010
4:58 pm
freespeechrules,
Evolution and our having a relationship with primates is a scientific fact. Calling me backwards having “faith” in science is kind of, well…backwards! You do realize bonobo chimpanzees and human beings share 96% of our genetic makeup, right?
There is no reason to get on topic. 99% of the liberal bashers on this blog have never listened to NPR and have no earthly idea what they are talking about.
JTesla
October 21st, 2010
4:58 pm
Kevin, sorry but I don’t believe that you are as objective in terms of history as you would like to think. When it comes to this topic I don’t believe that I am biased for one religion (Christianity as perhaps is presumed). For instance Islam has, when compared to Christianity, been historically far more tolerant of both Christianity and Judaism, not a typical opinion, but one I’ve argued based on history. Using that same objectivity, I then turn to the Crusades and realize that they weren’t driven by religion, but by a quest for power. A quest of power by a man in Rome, and boredom from men in Europe, which meant bad things for the predominantly Christian and Jewish towns they laid siege to. Religion was the excuse, in modern times the wars are still there, but the excuse is not used as often. Sure, power isn’t a belief system, but then you are simply narrowly construing your argument to fit your non-objective ends.
What's Important
October 21st, 2010
4:59 pm
Drew Williams: When racist remarks are condoned, whether made by the majority or the minority, they will only get louder and more divisive. My point it is not one side or the other, all suffer and that is good for no one.
freespeechrules
October 21st, 2010
5:01 pm
@Mom Dukes
You’ve said it best and like it is. That should end the debate right here, but it won’t.
@Juan Johnson
Civility is still alive, it just isn’t rearing it’s head much today. Political Correctness has harmed it.
Drew Williams
October 21st, 2010
5:03 pm
@What’s Important: True, but bigotry by those in charge is, in practice and in reality, more far reaching and damaging in the real world. For example, I have yet to see a photograph of a white man hanging from a tree, put their by black racists. Power makes all the difference.
freespeechrules
October 21st, 2010
5:03 pm
@JTesla
Again you have said a great thing that is so true that I will actually stop remarks to Kevin altogether.
JT is ruled by his head, not his heart or anger or taking sides on anything. We should learn from that.
freespeechrules
October 21st, 2010
5:07 pm
@Drew Williams
Valid point. Power is an aphrodisiac for many.
DK
October 21st, 2010
5:08 pm
@Drew Williams October 21st, 2010 4:55 pm – Absolute garbage. Racism is racism and bigotry is bigotry, no matter the source. Bigotry in the black community is having a huge impact on the improvement of race relations. The black community has hid behind your excuse for too long to excuse bigotry that is poisoning the black community. This bigotry is a major roadblock to the improvement of race relations in this country. Bigotry is not acceptable in mainstream white America anymore so get the beam out of your own eye before you attempt to remove the speck from mine.
kmb
October 21st, 2010
5:09 pm
Ms. Schiller:
Which group of people is the principal concern of the TSA at Hartsfield-Jackson Airport today?
Don’t know? Go ask your psychiatrist.
Allan Rofer
October 21st, 2010
5:09 pm
Nice spin from Vivian. She makes a false distinction between a staffer and a contractor. If anything, a contractor should have even more freedom to express opinions, so her logic is faulty. This firing is un-American.
I say we take her up on her bloviation about funding and rip the tax funds out from underneath what has become an embarrassment to the American people.
kenlev
October 21st, 2010
5:11 pm
What’s Important, I read these blogs often, and it’s usually the conservative mindset that come on here with all the racial monikers and limited tolerance that is really ignorant just like Fox News. you guys show me that your brain is not strong enough to think for itself, so you watch all this political bullsh*t on fox that makes it even worse. You blame everyone but yourself for your short comings. If you hate Blacks, Hispanics, Asian, Jews, and Muslims why don’t you do act like a man and have some real dialog and stop being a coward. These blogs are for ideas of people with a open midframe for making this world a better place, not bigots and dummies that only fan the flames of hatred.
freespeechrules
October 21st, 2010
5:12 pm
@Allen Rofer
You said what many have said, but in a more distinct and compact way.
Drew Williams
October 21st, 2010
5:12 pm
@DK: Hate to disagree, but that’s like saying “a hit is a hit” in baseball, when one was a single and the other a three-run homer. One definitely make a larger impact, and bigotry held by the minority while never good, makes a smaller impact than bigotry held by those who actually move the levers of institutional power. A simple review of history proves that out — as well as some photos of people hanging around in trees.
DK
October 21st, 2010
5:14 pm
BTW Drew Williams, you want to talk about who’s in power. The last time I checked, the President of the United States is black. “We’re don’t have power” doesn’t wash anymore.
kmb
October 21st, 2010
5:15 pm
I forgot to mention. Contributions to Public Radio and Television and NPR are tax deductible charity donations, another form of federal financing.
shcady
October 21st, 2010
5:16 pm
So one of the ionstances you use in terminating him was his comment about M. Obama. God fordid. How about outing the pres. and his wife for the hateful thing they have both done and said about the USA many time. They are both not worthy of the honor oof being the pres and first lady. if they had the USA so much move them the hell back to where they came from.
Dave from GT
October 21st, 2010
5:17 pm
Vivian is one arrogant b*tch!
I have never heard NPR on any station that is not affiliated with public taxpayer funding.!
Have you?
Georgia Public Radio carries NPR…… simple…… get it???
The play on university radio stations which are taxpayer subsidized and subject to freedom of speech constitutional requirements.
If she wants to pursue this direction, then the State(s) need to tell NPR to find another broadcast channel….. and stay the hell off the taxpayer subsidized radio.
I don’t like some unelected liberal b@tch trying to squelch Juan.
She should really think about firing the dowdy boring commentators that work for NPR and replace them with ones who can deliver news and commentary in a balanced real world manner.