Posted on April 25, 2024 by Steven Hayward in Fake News, Media, Media Bias

Crisis at NPR?

The saga of how state-run radio (better known as NPR) continues to fester, despite the best attempts of NPR’s new apparatchick, Katherine Maher, to suggest her previous hostile comments about free speech, her “my trutherism,” and her Democratic partisanship are all “taken out of context.” (Understand that for the contemporary left, “context” is everything, so claiming something anyone says is “taken out of context” is not a denial that they meant what they said. You’re just not choosing the “right” context to understand it properly.)

Yesterday the New York Times reported on “Inside the Crisis at NPR,” and it could easily be a premier entry in our currently dormant “Civil War on the Left” series. Lots of fun bits:

NPR’s troubles extend far beyond concerns about its journalism. Internal documents reviewed by The New York Times and interviews with more than two dozen current and former public radio executives show how profoundly the nonprofit is struggling to succeed in the fast-changing media industry. It is grappling with a declining audience and falling revenue — and internal conflict about how to fix it. . .

A yearslong push to diversify NPR’s staff, in part to lure listeners beyond its aging and predominantly white audience, hasn’t generated the listenership boost some executives had hoped for. . .

The organization is now led by Katherine Maher, who started as NPR’s chief executive last month after leading the Wikimedia Foundation, which supports the online encyclopedia Wikipedia. Ms. Maher had no professional experience in the news industry.

Sounds like the perfect person for the job!

The best part of the story, though, is the angst over NPR failing the crucial identitarian diversity test. NPR’s listening audience is 75 percent white, and that won’t do. Having state-run Democratic Party media is useless unless it reinforces the previous voting habits of minorities, which are slipping away from Democrats right now.

One 2020 survey, from the Pew Research Center, found that of the people who named NPR as their main source for political and election news, 75 percent were white, more than any other outlet except Fox News. . .

OMG—The Times is comparing NPR to Fox News! That has to hurt. There is no lower blow imaginable.

NPR’s leaders redoubled their efforts to diversify their audience and work force and closely tracked metrics for each. They added podcasts aimed at people of color and younger listeners. They promoted people of color to high-profile reporting and hosting jobs. All of these moves were meant to ensure the nation’s public radio network would remain competitive as the country’s population continued to grow more diverse.

So it came as a disappointment to some people on NPR’s board last fall when they were presented new internal data showing their efforts hadn’t moved the needle much with Black and Hispanic podcast listeners. . .

NPR’s efforts to diversify itself and its audience didn’t always live up to the expectations of the people who worked there. During a round of layoffs last year, NPR cut “Louder Than a Riot,” a hip-hop podcast that examined Black and queer issues. After that decision, the show’s editor, Soraya Shockley, who had previously worked at The Times, grilled Mr. Lansing [NPR’s previous president] during an employee question-and-answer session about why the show had no dedicated budget, pointing out the lack of resources supporting content that furthered diversity, equity and inclusion, or D.E.I.

The angst over this turned into a Maoist struggle session:

Later on the call, after Mr. Lansing urged employees to be more mindful of “civility” in their questions, an NPR employee wrote in an instant-messaging chat accompanying the conversation that the word ‘civility’ is often used as a cudgel against people of color, calling the language choice “racist.”

After the meeting, Shockley filed a human resources complaint against Mr. Lansing, saying his remarks about civility amounted to “dog-whistle racism,” according to a person with knowledge of the exchange. The complaint against Mr. Lansing was referred to an outside law firm, which did not recommend any punitive action.

Yet another lesson in how every revolution sooner or later eats its own.

Chaser—forbid the thought that “diversity” might include diversity of ideological views:

Still, some critics of NPR believe NPR’s “North Star” strategy has failed for a completely different reason: It has not taken ideological diversity into account. Tim Eby, who was the general manager of St. Louis Public Radio until 2020, said in an interview that while it made sense for NPR to seek an audience that looked more like the country, he wasn’t sure its approach was the right one. And its story selection has on occasion left it open to criticism that its focus on race and identity has affected its news judgment. There have been stories, for instance, on how to “decolonize your bookshelf” and “thin privilege.”

You’ll never guess what happened next! Eby was dismissed (on charges that he created a hostile racist environment at the station), and is now suing St. Louis Public Radio for defamation.

Posted on by Scott Johnson in 2020 Presidential Election, Donald Trump, Law, Trump Prosecutions

The Arizona indictment

Now an Arizona grand jury has handed up a 2020 election-related indictment procured by Arizona’s Democratic attorney general. The indictment includes charges against Rudy Giuliani, Mark Meadows, and others in connection with the scheme Trump was pursuing in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election. Trump is named an unindicted co-conspirator.

The indictment is posted online here. Politico’s story on the indictment deciphers the names redacted from the indictment at present. Politico also identifies defendants whose names are visible in the version of the indictment released by the Arizona attorney general’s office Wednesday evening as the 11 Republicans who posed as the state’s presidential electors. They include former Arizona GOP Chairwoman Kelli Ward, state senators Jake Hoffman and Anthony Kern, and Arizona’s RNC committeeman Tyler Bowyer.

I asked my friend Andrew McCarthy to comment on the indictment. This is what he had to say:

I think it’s revisionist history and tells half a story. In real time, January 2021, nobody believed the cobbling together of Trump electors in contested states was a coup effort. It was a contingency: If Trump had prevailed in any of his unlikely challenges, the Trump electors could be swapped in for the prior Biden elector slates.

I think whatever documents they executed were with that understanding. No one thought those slates would be operative unless Trump prevailed in state court or the state legislature.

I’ve always thought this was a big tell: If the so-called fake electors scheme was a crime, why has Smith not indicted it? It’s mentioned in the Trump indictment, but it’s not charged as a crime, nor have any electors or those coordinating them been indicted for fraud, false statements, or manipulating evidence.

In other words — one more front in the Democrats’ election interference and lawfare campaign .

Posted on by Scott Johnson in Biden Administration, Books, Joe Biden

Half a mind to be president

I have set the over/under on President Biden’s mental capacity at 40 percent. He has half a mind to be president. Yesterday he read the instruction inserted in the text of his remarks to “Pause” for the crowd to take up the chant of “Four more years.”

The White House has posted the transcript of Biden’s remarks to North America’s Building Trades Union National Legislative Conference here. However, Biden’s reading of the instruction to “pause” has mysteriously disappeared from the transcript. The transcript substitutes “(inaudible).” Below is a screenshot of the transcript passage.

John posted video here yesterday. Below is the 11-second clip of the passage above. Pause, indeed.

Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.

Posted on by Scott Johnson in Anti-Semitism, Higher education, House of Representatives, Republicans

Leadership from the Speaker

In an act of leadership that contrasts with the malicious indifference of President Biden and his team, House Speaker Mike Johnson went up to Columbia University to call for the restoration of order on campus. He spoke from the steps of Low Library to denounce the treatment of Jewish students on campus. I have posted video below.

Johnson was joined by a GOP delegation including Reps. Virginia Foxx, Anthony D’Esposito, Mike Lawler, and Nicole Malliotakis. The Free Beacon’s Jessica Costescu covers their campus appearance here. This is what Johnson had to say in his prepared remarks:

We’re here today at one of America’s preeminent academic institutions on a very important day in a very important time. Throughout history, Columbia students have contributed to the great storybook of America’s life and thought. Visionary American leaders like Alexander Hamilton and John Jay and the Jewish leader Gershom Seixas knew the self-evident truth that was at the heart of this country, and once, at the heart of this university. And that is that we are endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights. They should not be infringed.

The Founders and the great leaders who had come through this institution in the past believed in religious liberty. They believed in democracy. They believed in morality and virtue and the dignity of every human person. They believed in the free exchange of ideas, and they detested mob rule.

We are standing here right now in the steps of the Low Library. In this very building right behind us, Columbia University once awarded Winston Churchill in an honorary degree, and it was Churchill who said, “It is manifestly right that Jews should have a national home where they may be reunited.” We believe in that principle, and today I’m here to proclaim to all those who gnash their teeth and demand to wipe the state of Israel off the map and attack our innocent Jewish students, this simple truth: neither Israel, nor these Jewish students on this campus, will ever stand alone.

Today, Hamas issued an endorsement statement of the protestors on this campus. They called them the future leaders of America. It is detestable. All of this has to be said because the cherished traditions of this university are being overtaken right now by radical and extreme ideologies. They place a target on the backs of Jewish students in the United States, and here on this campus, a growing number of students have chanted in support of terrorists. They have chased down Jewish students. They have mocked them and reviled them. They have shouted racial epithets. They have screamed at those who bear the star of David.

They have told Jewish students who wear the star of David to leave the country and shamefully some professors and faculty have joined the mobs. Things have gotten so out of control that the school has canceled in-person classes, and now they’ve come up with this hybrid model where they will discriminate against Jewish students. They’re not allowed to come to class anymore for fear of their lives. And it’s detestable.

As Columbia has allowed these lawless agitators and radicals to take over, the virus of antisemitism is spread across other campuses. By some counts, as many as 200 universities have a similar form of protest. Right now at Yale, a Jewish student was stabbed in the eye with a Palestinian flag and 45 students were arrested. At NYU, Pro-Hamas protestors were shouting from the ‘river to the sea.’ Anti-Israel encampments are popping up at universities all across this country.

The madness has to stop. We just left a meeting with Jewish students who told us of the heinous acts of bigotry that they have experienced simply because of their faith. Their bravery is inspiring, much more inspiring than some of the activities we’re seeing here. They should never have to confront such hate on an American college campus at such a revered institution.

Antisemitism has been growing in America and it’s clear why. Powerful people have refused to condemn it, and some have even peddled it themselves. From university professors to public officials, people in positions of authority have denied the horrific facts of September 11th, 2001, the attacks on the United States. That happened right here in New York City, and they’ve attempted to excuse or to ignore the barbaric attack of Hamas in Israel on October 7th, 2023. Where Israeli women and children were savagely raped and murdered, and infants were cooked in ovens.

Crowds of radical left activists have chanted death to America, and on our own streets in this country, and some public officials have refused to condemn them. Others have openly defended these acts on campus and the harassing and the intimidation and the threatening of innocent Jewish students simply because of who they are. They’ve called that peaceful protest, and some have even gone as far as calling for the state of Israel to be eliminated. These are words we expect from Ayatollahs in Iran, not American lawmakers, and not American students. And unsurprisingly, it has given way to threats and violence in a generation of students don’t feel safe in their own classrooms or where they live or where they worship. Let me say this very simply, no American of any color or creed should ever have to live under those kinds of threats. That is not who we are in this country.

Sadly, Columbia’s administrators have chosen to let the threats, the fear, and the intimidation of the mob rule to overtake American principles like free speech and the free exchange of ideas and the free exercise of religion. They have co-opted First Amendment arguments to protect genocide and to elevate the voices of antisemitism. They have proven themselves to be incapable of achieving their basic responsibility, which is keeping students safe. We just can’t allow this kind of hatred and any antisemitism to flourish on our campuses, and it must be stopped in its tracks. Those who are perpetrating this violence should be arrested.

And I’m here today joining my colleagues in calling on President Shafik to resign if she cannot immediately bring order to this chaos. As Speaker of the House, I’m committing today that the Congress will not be silent. As Jewish students are expected to run for their lives and stay home from their classes hiding in fear. In the House of Representatives, we’ve already acted to address antisemitism on campuses. We have passed a number of statutes to address this matter, and we call upon the U.S. Senate to act upon our legislation.

Via Ian Schwartz/RCP.

Posted on April 24, 2024 by Steven Hayward

Jon Stewart Skewers the Media’s Trump Coverage

Normally I expect that Jon Stewart, freshly back hosting The Daily Show on Mondays, will use his show to bash Trump. But this week he surprised by using a 15-minute opening segment to bash the media’s coverage of the Trump trial going on right now in Manhattan. I have to say it is pretty effective at making the media look stupid.

It goes off the rails when he brings on Daily Show correspondent Jessica Williams at the 12 minute mark, and you can skip the rest at that point.

Posted on by Lloyd Billingsley in History

Ode to an Uncle

Joe Biden believes that his uncle, Second Lt. Ambrose J. Finnegan Jr., could have been eaten by cannibals after being shot down over Papua New Guinea during World War II. There is no evidence for the claim, and current PNG prime minister James Marape protests that “my country does not deserve to be labeled as such.” While this plays out, let me tell you about my uncle, World War II veteran James Richard Billingsley.

In the spring of 1942, uncle Jim left his university studies and signed up with Canada’s 8th Reconnaissance Regiment, known for being “first in, last out.” Uncle Jim was wounded twice in action, once by a German sniper. Army brass tapped him for intelligence work, but he returned to his regiment and fought on. Behind the lines, the Nazi foes had been busy.

From July 1942 until September of 1944, the Nazis deported 97,776 Jews from the Westerbork transit camp in Holland. A full 54,930 were shipped to Auschwitz, 34,313 to Sobibor, 4,771 to the Theresienstadt ghetto and 3,762 to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. On April 12, 1945, troops of the 8th Reconnaissance B squadron liberated the Westerbork camp, saving 876 Jews. American units liberated other death camps and American troops joined Canadians in the First Special Service Force. The FSSF was the elite unit that swept Nazi forces from Monte La Difensa, and other strongholds, opening the way for the Allies to move north.

Any WWII vets still around are doubtless shocked to see Nazi-style mobs on college campuses, screaming for a second Holocaust. The vets understand the perils of appeasing totalitarian aggressors, and Biden’s appeasement of Iran and China surely leaves them troubled. The vets would appreciate Lt. Finnegan, but Biden’s cannibal claim would have sprung a laugh from uncle Jim.

He served until 1946, finished his university studies, and earned a good living for his family. Uncle Jim died in 2017 at the age of 94, still bearing the scars of battle. Joe Biden and Justin Trudeau are not worthy to carry his shoes.

Posted on by John Hinderaker in Crime, Democrats, Minnesota

America’s Native Criminal Class?

Mark Twain said that there is no distinctly American criminal class except Congress. However, he didn’t know about the Minnesota DFL party’s legislative delegation:


I wrote last night about Nicole Mitchell, the Democratic state senator who was arrested for first degree burglary after she broke into her stepmother’s home in northern Minnesota, some 3 1/2 hours from where Mitchell lives. After consulting a lawyer (and, I suspect, Democratic Senate leaders who want to hold on to their one-vote majority), Mitchell put out a statement in which she claimed that she had been performing a welfare check on her stepmother, who she says suffers from Alzheimer’s.

Sure, that makes sense. Everyone performs welfare checks by breaking into a basement window at 4:00 in the morning, clothed in black and equipped with a flashlight covered with a black sock, and completes the welfare check by purloining someone else’s laptop. Walter Hudson, a Republican legislator, posted a photo of the basement window that Senator Mitchell broke into:


Sure, that is how we all perform welfare checks. Now the transcript of the victim’s 911 call, which led to Mitchell’s arrest, has been made public. It makes for entertaining reading. The victim certainly didn’t think that she was the beneficiary of a welfare check by a relative:

A. Please just get here.

Q. All right. I’ll stay on–I’ll stay on the line with you. Don’t worry. I have officers en route right now. If you hear anything, just let me know what’s going on, OK?

A. Okay.

Q. Are you armed?

A. I have a little steak knife in my hand right now.

Great welfare check! More:

[A] 911 caller now identified as Sen. Nicole Mitchell’s stepmother said “Somebody has broken into my house… and they just ran down into the basement,” according to a 911 transcript obtained by KARE 11 News through a data practices request.

“I don’t know if he’s breaking out the back window or what,” the caller continued.

“Did you get a good look at him at all?” dispatcher Joe Robbins asked.

“No, it was completely dark. I tripped over ’em. Ah, he was on the floor next to my bed. He ran downstairs into my basement.”

Senator Mitchell was lying on the floor next to the victim’s bed. Far from identifying herself as a relative conducting a wellness check, the black-clad senator, mistaken for a man, fled to the basement where she had broken in. And where, fortunately, she was apprehended, telling local police “I know I did something bad” and “Clearly I’m not good at this.”

But that was then, and this is now. Today Mitchell is defending her actions and portraying herself as a victim of her demented stepmother’s paranoia. Still no explanation for breaking in the basement window.

Of course, the Democrats aren’t seriously trying to fool anyone. They just want to erect enough of a smoke screen to explain why Mitchell isn’t resigning, and thus triggering a special election that could flip control of the Senate to Republicans. When power is at stake, Democrats aren’t much worried about principle. Or criminality.