NPR's new leader, Gary E. Knell, comes from the world of children's television — "Sesame Street" and so forth. That's an...
interesting solution to a political problem. The NPR board claims it was "looking for someone who, while he or she might not be a journalist, would gain the respect of journalists." And "Sesame Street" was the place to go for that? The question raised is: Where were all the leaders in the field of journalism? Were they all too politicized to get NPR out of the "cross hairs"? (I think "crosshairs" is one word, but that's the way NPR writes it.)
Over the past year, NPR has been roiled by a series of controversies — including the termination of the contract of news analyst Juan Williams last October, followed by an undercover video sting by the conservative provocateur James O'Keefe III in March. An edited version of the video released by O'Keefe appeared to show NPR's top fundraiser disparaging Republicans and Tea Party conservatives, though a closer review of the complete video showed many of those remarks were presented in a profoundly misleading way.
Much of NPR's senior leadership was swept away, including its news chief, the fundraising official and its chief executive, Vivian Schiller.
Congressional Republicans also renewed a push to cut all federal funding for the public radio system. That push fell short. But NPR's board — which is dominated by member stations that rely on federal money much more heavily than NPR itself — took the funding threat very seriously.
Solution? A man associated only with children's television.
Knell... wants to get out of the way of its journalists, whom he called "amazingly fabulous."
"The point here is that it's not about liberal or conservative. It's about fairness," Knell said. "We've got to make the case th [...]
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