An Open Letter to my public radio station (biased, leader, financial)

[Yeledaf]

Dear K***:

I regret that I wil not be renewing my pledge to **** this year, owing to the recent decision by NPR to terminate Juan Williams. Mr. Williams has been a voice of reason and clarity for public radio for many years. His termination is a chilling example of censorship on the part of NPR's executive leadership. Nothing which Mr. Williams has said in any way crossed the line from what most reasonable Americans would consider acceptable commentary.

The additional comments by NPR's Vivian Schiller, referring to Mr. William's "psychiatrist", were insulting and hurtful, both from a journalistic and personal perspective, and indicate to me a level of ill-feeling and negativity on the part of NPR which disqualifies it and its affiliates from receiving further financial support. I will communicate my thoughts to my friends and colleagues, and urge them to join me in discontinuing their contributions to an organization whose leadership is so obviously biased and which threatens its employees' First Amendment rights at will. I further intend to communicate with Senators ***** and *****, as well as Representative *****, asking them to support current inquiries into the possibility of limiting or curtailing further public funding for NPR.

This is a critical time in our nation's history. It is most assuredly not the tme for efforts on the part of powerful media organizations -- particularly those which are citizen-funded -- to silence opinions with which its leadership is in disagreement.

Sincerely,

A Former Contributor