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Robb
SFN Regular

USA
1223 Posts

Posted - 10/22/2010 :  20:09:06  Show Profile Send Robb a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I find this interesting

Juan Williams Fired

These were the comments that got him fired:

Williams responded: "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."
Notice that he never said that Muslims were terrorists or that we should feel this way. He only said he felt this way. Why should he be fired?

Here is what NPR said:

Late Wednesday night, NPR issued a statement praising Williams as a valuable contributor but saying it had given him notice that it is severing his contract. "His remarks on The O'Reilly Factor this past Monday were inconsistent with our editorial standards and practices, and undermined his credibility as a news analyst with NPR,"


With that said will Cokie Roberts get fired from NPR for writing this:

Actually, Beck is worse than a clown. He’s more like a terrorist who believes he has discovered the One True Faith, and condemns everyone else as a heretic. And that makes him something else as well — a traitor to the American values he professes so loudly to defend.
Notice she actually calls Glenn Beck a terrorist unlike Juan Williams who called no one a terrorist.

I bet not. Politically correctness is conservatives (in this case a liberal in Williams) telling the truth and liberals getting offended and then suppress speech.

One further comment; has Fox News ever fired someone because they have liberal views? They frequently have liberals on their shows including Juan Williams quite frequently. Since NPR get public money I think all views should be given consideration not just the ones the management approves of.

Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master. - George Washington

Kil
Evil Skeptic

USA
13476 Posts

Posted - 10/22/2010 :  21:29:36   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Kil's Homepage  Send Kil an AOL message  Send Kil a Yahoo! Message Send Kil a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Hey Robb. I was going to respond directly, but this works for me.

And Fox has liberals or fake liberals that they trot out to show that they are fair and balanced. Why would they fire one of their fake liberals? They need them!

And Cokie Roberts called Glen Beck "more like a terrorist" which is not "actually" calling him a terrorist. You do agree with her that he is "worse than a clown" at least. Right?


Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.

Why not question something for a change?

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Dave W.
Info Junkie

USA
26020 Posts

Posted - 10/22/2010 :  23:01:00   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Dave W.'s Homepage Send Dave W. a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Robb

I find this interesting...
What I find interesting is how many people are willing to ignore the stated reasons for disciplinary actions and instead whine about "political correctness" or other such nonsense.

Juan Williams hasn't been a "liberal" for quite some time, if ever. Writing books about the Civil Rights movement doesn't make one a liberal (nor does it mean one is unbigoted about Muslims, what a stupid damn defense).

His problems with NPR began a long time ago, and this latest thing is nothing more than the last straw. At the beginning of 2009, NPR even asked Fox News to stop identifying Williams as an NPR analyst when he appeared on their shows because of remarks he made about Michelle Obama. And apparently, it's been a long-standing rule at NPR that the analysts who work for them aren't permitted to voice "personal opinions about controversial issues" because it damages their credibility.
He only said he felt this way. Why should he be fired?
Because it undermines his credibility as a news analyst, just like NPR says. They're supposed to be unbiased, but there was Williams, unashamedly stating his biases. He's been pulling this crap for a while, too.
With that said will Cokie Roberts get fired from NPR for writing this...
Don't you think it'd be fair for NPR to give her as much leeway as they gave to Juan Williams? Of course, someone like Roberts, who has defended death squads and a military dictatorship, and criticized Obama for going to Hawaii as if it were a foreign country isn't exactly the cream of the liberal crop, is she?
Politically correctness is conservatives (in this case a liberal in Williams) telling the truth and liberals getting offended and then suppress speech.
Wow. That's just insane. Nobody - nobody - has "suppressed" anyone's speech in this matter. Juan Williams does not have a constitutional right to be an NPR analyst. He is no less free now to speak than he was the day before yesterday - like the rest of us, he is free to stand on whatever street corner he wishes and spew his illiberal crappola to anyone who will listen. To suggest otherwise really is political correctness run amok.
One further comment; has Fox News ever fired someone because they have liberal views?
If you can believe HuffPo, the answer is "yes."
They frequently have liberals on their shows including Juan Williams quite frequently.
Juan Williams self-identifies as "not liberal," so you'll need to pick a different example.
Since NPR get public money...
NPR gets less than 2% of its budget from the Federal government, and it does so through competitive grants from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the National Endowment for the Arts. NPR hasn't received direct public funds for over 20 years.
...I think all views should be given consideration not just the ones the management approves of.
Of course, NPR gives regular time to David Frum and other conservatives for their opinion pieces, for which they aren't badgered by the show hosts (unlike on Fox, which I'll note gets advertising money from companies that are funded by government contracts, competitive grants and even direct bailouts, so perhaps Fox should be forced to give consideration to all views). Recently, NPR even had an interview with a Republican legislator in which he was allowed, unanswered, to say nasty things about the "Democrat Party," and the only response was due to a flood of letters and emails to NPR about the term "Democrat Party" (not about the other outrageous things he said), for which NPR gave the guy even more air time to say, incredibly, that he was sorry, he didn't know that "Democrat Party" was insulting.

Juan Williams wasn't hired by NPR to voice different opinions from management. He was hired for a particular job with particular rules, and he apparently decided that the rules were optional for him. As a result, he doesn't get to use NPR's microphones any longer, and instead has to content himself with a $2 million, 3-year contract with Fox, where he seems happier, anyway. Boo frikkin' hoo.

- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
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Why not question something for a change?
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Dave W.
Info Junkie

USA
26020 Posts

Posted - 10/22/2010 :  23:16:56   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Dave W.'s Homepage Send Dave W. a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Kil

And Cokie Roberts called Glen Beck "more like a terrorist" which is not "actually" calling him a terrorist.
Good catch, Kil. I missed that bit. Cokie Roberts called Beck a terrorist in the same way that Williams called some anonymous Muslims terrorists. And the defense is exactly the sort of semantic argument that gives rise to the current O'Donnell/Limbaugh nonsense about the Constitution not providing a separation between church and state (which, if one follows the logic completely, means that there are no 4th Amendment protections against police searching your car without warrant or probable cause, since "automobiles" aren't mentioned in the Constitution).

Of course, Roberts did call Beck a traitor, an assessment I agree with completely, and not for semantic reasons.

- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
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Dave W.
Info Junkie

USA
26020 Posts

Posted - 10/29/2010 :  10:45:00   [Permalink]  Show Profile  Visit Dave W.'s Homepage Send Dave W. a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Robb

Since NPR get public money I think all views should be given consideration not just the ones the management approves of.
More on this argument: Two days ago, NPR gave David Frum some time to explain - without any sort of 'liberal' response - why he was going to be voting a straight Republican ticket on November 2, and how it's because of all of Obama's failures. And this morning, I got to hear an economic advisor for Bush speak about what job outsourcing means for the economy. The idea that NPR only airs liberal views is ludicrous.

- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
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Ebone4rock
SFN Regular

USA
894 Posts

Posted - 10/29/2010 :  11:00:35   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Ebone4rock a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I not much of a conspiracy theorist but lets see....I watch Juan while drinking my coffee every Sunday on Fox News Sunday and he is a frequent guest of many of the Fox News programs. He says something mild on Fox which he should know would get him fired....he gets fired....then is immediately hired by who? FOX NEWS!! I bet NPR did not pay him $2,000,000.

Sounds like a pretty easy way to get out of a contract to me!

Haole with heart, thats all I'll ever be. I'm not a part of the North Shore society. Stuck on the shoulder, that's where you'll find me. Digging for scraps with the kooks in line. -Offspring
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filthy
SFN Die Hard

USA
14408 Posts

Posted - 10/29/2010 :  13:54:21   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send filthy a Private Message  Reply with Quote
Originally posted by Ebone4rock

I not much of a conspiracy theorist but lets see....I watch Juan while drinking my coffee every Sunday on Fox News Sunday and he is a frequent guest of many of the Fox News programs. He says something mild on Fox which he should know would get him fired....he gets fired....then is immediately hired by who? FOX NEWS!! I bet NPR did not pay him $2,000,000.

Sounds like a pretty easy way to get out of a contract to me!
Sounds like a prearrangement to me, and the only thing that keeps the fool Beck from being a terrorist is a lack of high explosives and the know-how to use them.




"What luck for rulers that men do not think." -- Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945)

"If only we could impeach on the basis of criminal stupidity, 90% of the Rethuglicans and half of the Democrats would be thrown out of office." ~~ P.Z. Myres


"The default position of human nature is to punch the other guy in the face and take his stuff." ~~ Dude

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Dude
SFN Die Hard

USA
6891 Posts

Posted - 10/29/2010 :  22:20:17   [Permalink]  Show Profile Send Dude a Private Message  Reply with Quote
I'd provide Beck with some explosives if I thought he would actually try and use them! He'd self detonate for sure.


Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson

"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin

Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth
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