Rick Sanchez at CNN, now Juan Williams of NPR gets cannabalized amid the ever increasing politically correct wave of the thought police.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20 ... rks-on-fox

Now, FWIW, I don't get scared seeing Muslims at the airport (I keenly study every last person that's boarding my flight), and if I did I would be savy enough to not say so on TV. That said, despite the humor of watching liberals eat their own (yes yes, I know conservatives and anyone in politics does it), Williams certainly didn't deserve to be fired from NPR, although I can't think of that as a bad life change.

Anyway, if our news journalists can't be free to speak their mind on talk shows that are meant to spew opinions in every form, we can't ever expect unbiased journalism. The validity of our news/opinion pieces will depend soley on the political slant of the employing organization for fear of termination. That's not a good place to be in.

I haven't read about Williams but Sanchez? This guy went out and straight up talked shit about CNN....his employer! I think this has less to do with him not "being able to speak his mind" and more to do with him being a fucking moron. His comments were stupid and tactless but the real issue IMO is that anyone who is dumb enough to go out publically and talk shit about the company that cuts them a a check is stupid and shouldn't be shocked when they get the boot.



I don't think his comments were enough to get him fired but like I said, talking shit about the company you work for is never smart if you still want to work for them.

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Are you fucking kidding me with this?



This is just more hateful anti-Mulsim rhetoric, and he deserves to be fired.

JUST BECAUSE SOMEONE IS A MUSLIM DOESN'T MEAN THEY ARE A TERRORIST.

That's not journalism. That's not investigative reporting.

Williams did go on to tell O'Reilly that he had to be "careful" to stress that he was not talking about all Muslims when he criticized some and that America was not at war with Islam. He also compared blaming all Muslims for the actions of extremists to blaming all Christians for the actions of Timothy McVeigh.

These tempered statements were/are ignored. If journalists should be fired every time they say something wrong, with the plethora of opinion based news shows there will eventually be a regular turnover due to regular terminations, or free discourse will just cease to exist.

I think more "journalists" should be fired when they say this kind of shit. When you say that Muslims scare you but then try and back peddle by saying "Uh...but...I'm not a bigot..." what should we believe? The bigot statement or the back peddling?

Examples:

"I'm not a racist BUT....when I see a black person walking the street at night I instantly think he's up to no good."

"Islam is a violent religion and Muslims scares me......but I'm not a bigot."

People should be held responsible for what they say, especially those in the media.

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I don't like those comments either, but there should probably be a pattern before termination. Williams certainly hasn't shown any type of pattern for comments like that. The flip side is really boring or disingenuous commentary, or a flat out Olbermann kind of company line propoganda.

Yes, he has. Williams has been on O'Riley many times in the past, and made other controversial comments. Last year, NPR asked Fox not to identify Williams as an NPR employee on their broadcasts because his comments did not reflect NPR's neutral stance.

Williams is a independent contractor for NPR. If NPR doesn't like what he's saying on other media outlets, they have every right to terminate his contract, and he did. They've clearly had issues with his comments in the past. This is not an isolated incident.

Exactly. Whatever Williams says is certain to reflect back upon NPR and if he's saying questionable, bigotted shit on Fox of all places I'm sure NPR doesn't appreciate the negative association. He kind of forced their hand so to speak. I'm sure they felt that they had to take action for fear of suffering negative PR.

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"...NPR's neutral stance."

Sure, NPR has every right to can Williams. I don't care what news org it is though, there ought to be a pattern. Whatever Williams said last year, it apparently wasn't much of a news making, over-the-top blowhard statement. He's said plenty of things that don't jive with FOX and gotten into pretty heated debates with various conservatives on FOX. I never hoped or expected that FOX would dump him though because his ideas didn't match theirs.

Whatever, I don't feel all that strongly about it anyway. This was more funny than troubling to me. It just seems that we're on a road to having computer generated voices reporting only the blandest of daily factoids, devoid of any analysis or personal commentary that might offend or disagree with somebody/something.

Oh, you're serious.
I listen to NPR every day...they have some good stuff on there but neutral they aint.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

oh...and Williams was on Fox in a "commentator" capacity, not a journalistic one.

He's a citizen with a right to an opinion.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

NPR is the closest thing to a neutral new organization that we have right now.

Yes, they do have some left leaning shows in regular rotation, but they're the only place I've been able to hear both sides of an argument that doesn't involve repeating talking points or yelling over each other.

Regardless, I think this notion that we're moving towards unopinionated parroting of facts only is crazy. It's completely the opposite. It's almost impossible to get any facts from the news media without their being a slant one way or another.

I as well listen to NPR everyday, and while they probably cant be considered neutral because of the choice of guests they have on, they are by no means 'leftist liberals' pushing any sort of agenda. In a media landscape now filled with pundits so far left and right that they're about to complete a circle, I definitely consider NPR the most central option.

Although, to be fair, each NPR station differs somewhat in it's content, so perhaps you've got the granola crunchers out there on the left coast.

No denying that.

However, on Fox, he was a commentator. On NPR, he was a contractor in a journalistic role. NPR decided that his comments on Fox undermined his credibility as journalist, and therefore he could no longer fulfill that role with NPR.

That's perfectly normal.

I agree, but I think it's equal parts organizational bias as well as individual bias.

Indeed...I get the Republic of Santa Monica version...the hosts regularly refer to Republicans as "the opposition" and "them" and Democrats are referred to as "we" and "us".

It's fucking ridiculous.



Pfft....99 times out of 100 Williams is on Fox News to be the leftie at the table.
Getting the boot for 1 comment out of years and years of toeing the party line seems a bit rash.

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Hold my beer and watch this...

Of course he has his right to an opinion and that's fine. Choosing to open your mouth and give a voice to that opinion is also fine. Being surprised by backlash though is silly.

I mean if someone from MSNBC were to go on the air and say Obama is Hitler or someone from Fox News went on and said they were excited because they just got a new "Obama Rocks!" bumper sticker no one would be surprised if that person got in trouble.

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So, I guess the point of this thread is to paint NPR as being as far to the left as fox news is to the right?

Except....dude wasnt fired for making a 'rightist' statement, he was fired for making a bigoted statement. Quite a difference. (well.........)

I thought this was about Mad Libs so here's one I did...

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Proud LGBTQQ Individual

I can at least attest to the first part, the Jizz White dragon IS the horniest dragon of all. The rest of it is pure poppycock. A cock shaped like a rimjob? that doesnt even make sense!