News and Opinion About the NPR Controversy: a Sampling

The controversy surrounding the undercover video showing Ronald Schiller, NPR’s former senior vice president for development, making comments about the Tea Party and Republicans has drawn a wide range of reactions from media outlets.

Below is a sampling of some news analyses about the video and the announcement that NPR’s chief executive, Vivian Schiller, resigned in the wake of the video’s release.

NPR: “Vivian Schiller, CEO Of NPR, Steps Down”

David Folkenflik, an NPR reporter, covered the controversy over the recent dismissal of NPR analyst Juan Williams, federal funding worries, and the concerns of the board. If federal funding of NPR ends, he said, 100 local stations could cease operations.

“I think the board … a majority of which is controlled by station officials themselves, our clients but also our corporate board members, felt that this was one misstep, one major black eye too many,” Mr. Folkenflik said.

BuzzMachine: “NPR’s inevitable conflict”

Jeff Jarvis, associate professor at the City University of New York’s Graduate School of Journalism, writes he’s concerned NPR lost a “visionary leader” and that the board at NPR looks like it caved under pressure. Ultimately, he says, NPR and the local stations that make up its board no longer have the same interests.

“That has been the case for some years,” he writes. “[Ms.] Schiller tried hard to find ways to improve the stations’ lot. That’s why she created new content initiatives in their backyards, to have them create more value. But in the end, the stations will fear a stronger NPR.”

New York Times: “Vivian Schiller, NPR Chief Executive, Resigns”

The New York Times’s Media Decoder blog was one of the first to interview Ms. Schiller after her resignation was announced.

“I’m hopeful that my departure from NPR will have the intended effect of easing the defunding pressure on public broadcasting,” Ms. Schiller said.

Wall Street Journal: “NPR CEO Resigns Over Hidden Video”

Reporter Russell Adams also interviewed Ms. Schiller on Wednesday, as well as Dave Edwards, chairman of the board at NPR.

“The CEO is accountable for all of the operations of that organization,” Mr. Edwards said. “We determined it was a wise move to accept her resignation.”

Time: “Video Takes Down the Radio Exec: NPR CEO Steps Down After Sting”

James Poniewozik, a Time columnist, writes that the resignation looks like a move to silence criticism, even though Ms. Schiller had little to do with the video controversy and much more to do with the firing of Mr. Williams. Ultimately, he writes, public radio stations may be safe from congressional cuts anyway.

“A cutoff would hurt red states—whose small TV and radio stations would be decimated—far more than the better-funded urban blue-state bastions of NPR and PBS,” Mr. Poniewozik writes.

Washington Examiner: “Why NPR Should Urge Congress to End Its Subsidy”

Political analyst and Fox News contributor Michael Barone wrote Tuesday night that NPR should embrace an end to federal funding. Using the National Trust for Historic Preservation as an example, he explains how in 1994 the organization asked for a drawdown in the money it received from the federal government over three years as it worked to find new funding sources. Mr. Barone writes that the experiment was a success.

“NPR today has a much larger constituency than the National Trust had 16 years ago and much less dependence on federal support,” Mr. Barone writes. “It has a news product of great distinctiveness and, many believe, high quality.”

Slate: “In Defense of Ron Schiller”

Jack Shafer, who writes about the media for Slate, admits in his first sentence that he doesn’t support NPR but makes an argument for defending Mr. Schiller. Ultimately, Mr. Shafer said that he and others would likely have responded differently if they had been in Mr. Schiller’s position. But, he says, “we’d last about 15 seconds in the fund-raising business if every time a potential donor said something crazy or offensive, we told them to shut their pie hole,” he writes.

Poynter: “Vivian Schiller’s Resignation Caps ‘Traumatic’ Six Months at NPR Amid Allegations of Bias”

Steve Myers, managing editor of Poynter.org, the Web site of the journalism think tank Poynter Institute, recapped the controversy and also covered this morning’s NPR press conference live. A transcript is available on its Web site.

Jonathan Capehart: “NPR Fund Raisers Ignore Unmistakable Red Flags”

Writing on the Washington Post’s PostPartisan blog, Mr. Capehart says the undercover video could have been easily avoided if Mr. Schiller had researched the fictional prospective donors and searched for red flags.

“They engaged in a conversation about the Tea Party and its impact on the Republican Party and U.S. politics,” Mr. Capehart wrote. “Any skillful fundraiser should know how to handle this dicey topic without being rude to his host or potentially endangering his institution.”

The Century Foundation: “Three Strikes at NPR”

Peter Osnos, senior fellow at The Century Foundation, highlighted the string on controversies, but said he believes NPR has never been stronger. He wrote that the current situation – which a resigning chief executive and federal funding cuts “all but certain” – is a temporary setback the organization can overcome.

“The audience [NPR] serves has been growing, and they are not the people who were responsible for mistakes in NPR’s executive suite,” Mr. Osnos wrote. “They should not therefore be the ones who are punished.”

Scott Rosenberg: “Sting Culture and NPR’s Capitulation to Falsehood”

Mr. Rosenberg, the co-founder of Salon magazine, writes about his anger over “public life… becoming a maze of entrapments.” Mr. Rosenberg calls out Mr. O’Keefe for his methods and the news media for not confirming everything by viewing the full tape before reporting on it.

“In a saner cultural moment, a serial liar like O’Keefe would not be taken seriously by the rest of the media or by a board of directors,” Mr. Rosenberg wrote.

The tape and Vivian Schiller’s departure as chief executive of NPR may put an end to plans for a major social media campaign designed to save NPR’s federal funds.

“Ironically, the negative press could be a hidden blessing: prior to the scandal, NPR might have suffered a quiet death, buried underneath Middle East and Wisconsin headlines,” the magazine writes. “Now, the loss of local stations becomes a very real, and very prominent, issue for millions of Americans.”

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Columbia Journalism Review: “NPR Flubs Response to Schiller Controversy”

Columnist Joel Meares writes that NPR’s “overreaction” to the video and resignation of Ms. Schiller leaves the organization fundamentally weakened in the eyes of donors and news consumers, but doesn’t change anyone’s mind.

“Most people—and certainly those who’d care—already think NPR is liberal, and this ad hoc attempt to convince them otherwise will not convince them otherwise,” Mr. Meares writes. “Parting ways with Vivian Schiller is a dramatic face-saving exercise that has no chance of working.”