We all know that NPR is biased to the left, but only now do we know how totally addled NPR has become, consumed with dislike for George W. Bush, and also, to a lesser extent, disdain for one of its own employees, Juan Williams.
The Washington Post's Howard Kurtz gets the story first, as he so often does: It seems that the White House reached out to Williams, offering him an interview with the President on civil rights--this being the 50th anniversary of President Dwight Eisenhower's courageous decision to send federal troops to Little Rock, Ark., to enforce integratration orders.
But NPR said no. As Williams told Kurtz, he was "stunned" by NPR's decision. Here's Williams, in his own words:
"It makes no sense to me. President Bush has never given an interview in which he focused on race. . . . I was stunned by the decision to turn their backs on him and to turn their backs on me."
NPR's Ellen Weiss told Kurtz that the network rejected the interview because the White House had suggested Williams, and that's some sort of editorial interference in the Dupont Circle mindset of NPR.
In fact, NPR is lucky to have Williams, who is one of the best journalists working around--he's also one of the best historians, too, being the author of three books on civil rights and the civil rights movement.
A source familiar with the situation explains the context to The Cable Game: "The real story here is that NPR doesn't like Juan. He works at Fox after all. If the White House had offered the interview to Tavis Smiley, NPR would've taken it in a heartbeat."
This source, whom we will call Deep Radio--and call upon again, in the future, I suspect--is on to something. Williams is no conservative, but he's no left-winger, either, and he does moonlight at Fox, too. So,even though Williams is a perfectly likeable fellow, of course his NPR colleagues loathe him. Of course they are happy to tear him down, even if that means hurting NPR.
By contrast, Smiley--who like Williams, is African-American, but who regularly reviles Republicans and then wonders why GOPers don't agree to appear with him--is exactly NPR's idea of "fair and balanced." So if by some accident Bush had wanted to be interviewed by someone who hates him, well, that would have been fine with NPR.
If NPR is the big loser, as Kurtz makes clear, the big winner is Fox News--because FNC got the story.
