Juan Williams, the NPR and FoxNews “journalist” that was fired when he said the following to Bill O’Reilly when asked about whether the United States was facing a Muslim Dilemma,
"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."
National Public Radio (NPR) quickly firing Juan William for his somewhat bigoted statement was unwarranted for the particular statement. Republicans attempting to defund NPR for firing Juan Williams is worst. That threat will have a chilling effect on NPR reporting that will make it less hard hitting and complete than it has always being known for.
The reality is Juan Williams should have been fired for many other reasons a very long time ago. He has allowed his reputation as a very good NPR journalist to be used to give FoxNews a level of credibility, objectivity, and gravitas that it could not garner given their news and commentary with a constant and high propensity for misinformation and outright lies.
It should come as no surprise that Juan Williams’ firing was used by FoxNews as a cry against the nonexistent liberal media and at the same time provide him with a two million dollar plus contract to continue his “liberal” viewpoint on FoxNews. FoxNews win. Juan Williams win. NPR loses for firing someone that diminishes their brand.
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Last month, Juan Williams appeared on Fox News Channel and expressed an opinion: he was all a-scurred of people on airplanes dressed in Muslim garb! Very soon after, Williams was sacked by his principal employer, National Public Radio.
While it was something of a novelty — media figures are typically allowed to say unkind and intemperate things about Muslims in America without fear of losing their jobs — it was pretty clear that NPR — who could have, I don’t know… asked any other human being in their organization to present a countering opinion if it meant that much to them — just didn’t much like Williams very much. Williams subsequently signed a $2 million/three-year deal with Fox News, and defunding NPR became a conservative cause.
Over at The Hill, Jordan Fabian reports that the GOP is preparing to get down to the business of "defunding" NPR:
House GOP Whip Eric Cantor (Va.) and Rep. Doug Lamborn (Colo.) said that cutting funds to the publicly subsidized news organization was the winner of the conference’s weekly "YouCut" contest, in which the public votes online on spending items they want eliminated.
