Juan Wiliams: Fired From NPR; Given A Bigger Contract At Fox

NPR fired Juan Williams because, on the Bill O'Reilly show, he had the temerity to actually express an opinion. Mr Williams said, regarding Muslims:

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."

The official statement from the NPR site:

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," the statement read.

You know, NPR -- where there are "All Things Considered." Apparently you can consider all things, you simply can't verbally express them in terms of your opinion.

And isn't it odd, I might posit (during my college days this might be the time where a professor would ask me to "contrast and compare" in my blue book), that Mr Williams is fired for expressing an opinion whereas other NPR associates have not; for example:

- Andrei Codrescu, who was on contract with NPR at the time, said in 1995 that "The evaporation of four million people who believe this crap [the Rapture] would leave the world an instantly better place." He later apologized, and NPR left it at that.

- In 1995, Nina Totenberg said "I think [Sen. Jesse Helms] ought to be worried about what's going on in the Good Lord's mind, because if there is retributive justice, he'll get AIDS from a transfusion, or one of his grandchildren will get it."

- In 1994 Sunni Khalid, an NPR reporter, said "I think there's a big difference when people told Father Aristide to sort of moderate his views, they were concerned about people being dragged through the streets, killed and necklaced. I don't think that is what Newt Gingrich has in mind. I think he's looking at a more scientific, a more civil way of lynching people."

- This year Sarah Spitz, who has contributed a number of pieces to NPR's biggest magazine programs "Morning Edition" and -- get this -- "All Things Considered," claimed to her fellow liberals on JournoList she would "Laugh loudly like a maniac and watch his eyes bug out" if Rush Limbaugh were dying in front of her.

Hey, good times eh?

But perhaps the largest shard of irony, in new and improved Chunky Size:

Fired from NPR, Fox just awarded Juan Williams a new contract because of this incident -- for $2 million dollars.

Mr Williams, in his Thursday opinion piece for Fox News wrote that he was "fired for telling the truth."

I'd say: why yes, he was. And he said it in a much kinder way than I.

BZ