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American and Latin American Politics, Society, and Culture

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NPR CEO forced out by the board

Following up on yesterday’s story (you can watch the full unedited video here, in addition to the clip I posted yesterday),
Juan Williams responded to the video,

“I think it is a look inside what NPR executives really think, and for me this is a revelation in the sense that here they are saying exactly how they view the world,” Williams said. “And what’s incredible to me is here they are doing business with people who identify themselves as members of the Muslim Brotherhood.”

Today NPR CEO Resigns Over Hidden Video

National Public Radio President and Chief Executive Vivian Schiller resigned in the wake of comments by a fellow executive that angered conservatives and renewed calls to end federal funding for public broadcasting.

The chairman of NPR’s board of directors announced Wednesday morning that he has accepted Ms. Schiller’s resignation, effective immediately.

NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik said in a tweet that Ms. Schiller was forced out by the board.

Now It is Time for Big Bird to Fly on His Own

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I’m sure Juan Williams’s lawyers will find this NPR video interesting,

NPR executives caught on tape bashing conservatives and Tea Party, touting liberals

At the Café Milano lunch, Schiller said he’s “very proud of” how NPR fired Juan Williams. “What NPR stood for is non-racist, non-bigoted, straightforward telling of the news and our feeling is that if a person expresses his or her opinion, which anyone is entitled to do in a free society, they are compromised as a journalist,” he said. “They can no longer fairly report.”

With that, Schiller once again directly contradicted NPR’s public statements. At her Monday press conference, Vivian Schiller apologized for the way it handled the Williams matter. “We handled the situation badly,” she said. “We acted too hastily and we made some mistakes. I made some mistakes.”

The rest of the conversation highlights Ron Schiller’s opinions on “Middle America”, the Tea Party, and the Muslim Brotherhood.

But hey, Schiller thinks NPR would be better without federal funding. That’s one thing we can agree on.

Harry Reid’s upset, though,

The quotable Harry Reid swings into action once again:

“The mean-spirited bill, H.R. 1, eliminates National Public Broadcasting,” said Reid in a floor speech. “It eliminates the National Endowment of the Humanities, National Endowment of the Arts. These programs create jobs. The National Endowment of the Humanities is the reason we have in northern Nevada every January a cowboy poetry festival. Had that program not been around, the tens of thousands of people who come there every year would not exist.”

As Guy Benson jokes, “Poof!  The way Reid tells it, tens of thousands of John Wayne/Walt Whitman enthusiasts would simply fall off the face of the earth if Republicans’ mean-spirited demonstrably modest cuts are adopted.”

Here’s Harry, saying that if it weren’t for a cowboy poetry festival “tens of thousands of people…would not exist.”

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A brief roundup on a busy evening, with tango VIDEO

Been busy all day, but found time for a roundup,

Bookworm lost her patience and now explains Attitude is everything . . . or why I yelled at my 88 year old mother

Play me the world’s smallest violin for Barack Obama and Robert Gibbs, but James Warren shows No Pity for Robert Gibbs and His ‘Modest’ Salary, and neither do I.

NPR exec who fired Juan Williams follows him out the door. Juan Williams rips NPR, for good reason. Tammy Bruce has video and transcript.

Doug Ross has the Great News: U.S. Department of Education helping to teach educators about Alinsky, Cloward-Piven and the Need for State-Run Media. Just what we needed.

Ace has the skinny on Liberals Reacting To Reading The Constitution In House Pretty Much Exactly As You Expected They Would.

Could somebody please tell John Boehner to stop crying? It’s unmanly, and annoying. Heck, the girl in True Grit would have smacked him on the side of the head for doing this,

Happy 80th Birthday to The Mighty Robert Duvall, and may he tango on for many more years,

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Nina, what Congress passed was – forgive the expression – a tax increase

Taxpayer-funded NPR’s Nina Totenberg (emphasis added)

I want to say one thing about the budget that didn’t get passed, the omnibus bill. You know, we talk a lot about – we just passed this huge tax cut in part because business said, you know, we have to plan, we have to know what kind of tax cuts we have. Well, these agencies, including the Defense Department, don’t know how much money they’ve got and for what. And I was at – forgive the expression – a Christmas party at the Department of Justice and people actually were really worried about this. These are law enforcement people don’t know exactly what kind of money they can spend for what.

Totenberg says “we”; who does she mean “we”? It was Congress, and unless she’s a member of Congress, she’s not part of the “we”.

Congress, since Nina seems to forgot, still has a Democratic Party majority until the new session starts. Nina’s concern over the DoJ and DoD apparently didn’t move her to press for Congress to have approved a budget earlier this year.

The so-called “huge tax cut” exists only in her addled brain. Ed:

Congress didn’t pass a tax cut.  They passed a bill that maintains the current tax rates in the same status they’ve been for seven years.  In fact, taxes went up because of the renewed estate tax; it just didn’t go up as much as Democrats wanted.  It’s only a tax cut if government feels that they were owed that tax increase and the money it would have taken out of the pockets of citizens above what they have already taken over the last decade.

Which wouldn’t surprise me if Nina believes.

And,
My response to the question, is “Christmas party” such a foul expression that it necessitates an apology? is
(more…)

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Juan Williams fired from NPR VIDEO

NPR Fires Analyst Over Comments on Muslims
And what was it he said that got him fired?

The move came after Mr. Williams, who is also a Fox News political analyst, appeared on the “The O’Reilly Factor” on Monday. On the show, the host, Bill O’Reilly, asked him to respond to the notion that the United States was facing a “Muslim dilemma.” Mr. O’Reilly said, “The cold truth is that in the world today jihad, aided and abetted by some Muslim nations, is the biggest threat on the planet.”

Mr. Williams said he concurred with Mr. O’Reilly.

He continued: “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. But when I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think, you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous.”

Mr. Williams also made reference to the Pakistani immigrant who pleaded guilty this month to trying to plant a car bomb in Times Square. “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,” Mr. Williams said.

Ed Morrissey has the video of Williams,

NPR had already more-or-less thrown Williams under the bus,

In February 2009, NPR said it had asked that he stop being identified on “The O’Reilly Factor” as a “senior correspondent for NPR,” even though that title was accurate.

Tammy Bruce:

Oh my gosh, look who just this week gave $1.8 million to…NPR? George Soros’ Millions Buying ‘Political Reporters’ for NPR

And golly gee, look who also just gave $1 million to Media Matters specifically to target Fox news and their hosts? Now George Soros Backs Media Matters; Beck Calls It a ‘Bounty’

NPR is also funded by your hard-earned taxpayer dollars.

Ed Driscoll has the photshop.

[Post re-edited to include missing paragraph]

UPDATE:
Turns out the handwriting is also on Mara Liasson’s wall.

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