Juan Williams, Fox, and NPR

[IBCoupe]

Juan Williams has been fired from NPR for comments he made on Fox News. Williams believes he's being persecuted a la Nixon, and NPR says that the most recent remarks are evidence that Williams' public role on Fox News as a political commentator is incompatible with his role as a political analyst on NPR.

Juan Williams has been a problem child for NPR's editors for a long time, and Williams may be right in suggesting that NPR was looking for a reason to fire him. In early 2009, Williams made some not so favorable comments comments about Michelle Obama that, in the context of viewing (opposed to reading) the comments, Williams admitted could easily be taken the wrong way, because of the style of commentary (fast-paced, argumentative) valued at Fox News. In response, NPR requested that Williams stop allowing Fox to identify him as an "NPR" political analyst.

This week, Williams said on the O'Reilley Factor that he gets afraid when he sees people in Muslim garb on planes (and, to his credit, then went on to say that it's wrong to make categorical statements about Muslims) and NPR, in returned terminated his contract as a political analyst. This, to me, seems very reasonable. While what Williams said about his own personal beliefs works very well as political commentary, the revelation that he has what might be bigotted beliefs calls into question his value to NPR listeners as a political analyst. This is what NPR means when it says that his role on Fox is incompatible with his former role on NPR.

It's an unfortunate turn of events for someone who had spent 10 years as an NPR political analyst (some of that time as the host of Talk of the Nation), but it's not, as Fox pundits and some political figures (e.g. Sarah Palin's recent twitter) might suggest, an attack on Williams' first amendment rights.