NYT: NPR’s News Chief Resigns After 9 Months: Period of instability

[DeepModem Mom]

NPR’s News Chief Resigns After 9 Months
By KATHARINE Q. SEELYE
Published: October 13, 2006

William K. Marimow, the top news executive at National Public Radio and the winner of two Pulitzer Prizes, has resigned after nine months in the job, the broadcasting network announced today. He agreed to become the ombudsman for the network.

The move is one of several changes within the network’s news division and signals a period of instability as many jobs are being filled hastily on an interim basis until permanent replacements can be found.

As part of its restructuring, the network is creating a new managing editor position to supervise shows and newscasts and has temporarily hired Richard Harris, who spent nine years as senior producer of ABC’s “Nightline” and “This Week” and was a former executive producer for NPR’s “All Things Considered.”

Some NPR employees who attended a staff meeting this morning when the changes were announced described it as harsh and even “nasty.” They also said that some of their colleagues praised Mr. Marimow for raising the network’s level of journalism....

***

He becomes the first major casualty of the two-week-old tenure of Ken Stern, NPR’s new chief executive, who replaced Kevin Klose, the chief executive who had hired Mr. Marimow from the Baltimore Sun. Mr. Klose remains at NPR as president. In promoting Mr. Marimow to vice president of news in February, Mr. Klose had overruled an internal search committee that included Mr. Stern and Mr. Kernis and had not recommended Mr. Marimow....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/13/business/media/14radiocnd.html?hp&ex=1160798400&en=74c5058158e14c76&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[Demeter]

1. How Unfortunate

I had noticed improvement in recent NPR newscasts. I suppose this is more of the GOP kicking the dog (NPR) when it has a bad day or 60.

[w4rma]

2. Why doesn't the NY Times say much about Ken Stern, except mention his name

and two week old position as CEO of NPR?

I would think that Ken Stern should be the focus of this article since it is him that is doing the firing and folks would like to know what type of people he will allow to be hired.

[DeepModem Mom]

3. I need more info here myself. I thought others might be...

more familiar with the situation and the players.

[gulfcoastliberal]

4. I stopped contributing after wha they did to Bob Edwards - and to fire him

after the bequest Ms. Crock of McDees fortune that they got - she must be rolling in her grave over how NPR is kowtowing to the GOP, in the vain hope (kind of like certain congressional dems) that by kissing elephant ass the repukes will be nice to them.

Edit: Good post from Leftcoaster, relevant even though 2 years old:



THE STORY NPR WON'T COVER
By larre

It's been more than a month since pencil heads Kevin Klose and Ken Stern, who escaped to National Public Radio from their propagadist jobs at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty pushed popular and award-winning Morning Edition host Bob Edwards out the studio door and hung a sign around his neck reading 'senior correspondent'.

Edwards, as most know, is the author of several books including the most recently published title, Edward R. Murrow and the Birth of Broadcast Journalism. He is the 1999 recipient of the Peabody Award for excellence in journalism and multiple others including the Edward R. Murrow Award and the Douglas Edwards Award.

Tens of thousands of loyal NPR listeners were outraged when Edwards was demoted or fired. They didn't hesitate to tell NPR administrators how dumb this move was.... Petitions ... message boards ... entire web sites ... and blogs to which I myself have contributed have been springing up everywhere.

One radio veteran reacted in a letter to outraged listeners this way:

'It was postured as a move to help NPR respond to the changing needs of public radio listeners,' Jim King, director of radio at WVXU in Cincinnati, wrote to his listeners. 'Since 'Morning Edition's' audience has more than doubled in the last decade and I've heard not one member complain about Bob's on-air sound, I stand in utter amazement that this was the initial reason given. . . . In my mind, it makes absolutely no sense to take the man, the voice, the identity of NPR's most popular program and usher him out of the anchor's chair.'

When Edwards was cashiered there were many who suspected it was because of a candid and thoughtful anti-war commencement address he had given at the University of Kentucky some time earlier. I have no opinion about this speculation, but after learning of it I went searching for the full text of the speech and discovered that extant copies on the 'Net were mysteriously disappearing even as I returned to look at them. So I archived the last available copy I could find at Daily Kos.

Ironically, what is clear is that the change was made possible by a historic bequest of Joan Kroc, the McDonald's heiress. Not that Joan Kroc would have enjoyed seeing Edwards fired -- one suspects quite the contrary. But a number of newspaper reports, including this one in the Philadelphia Inquirer (free subscription required) are suggestive that her gift nevertheless has been seized upon as the catalyst:

'When talk of NPR's future, they talk of increasing news coverage, providing more context at a time when broadcasters are cutting back on world affairs. NPR, with a $200 million gift from the late Joan B. Kroc, has the ability to fill the void.'

Except, as it turns out, listeners are noticing that Morning Edition actually has been lightening up on its hard news the last month or so and filling the air with more weightless 'human interest' features and faster-talking conservative 'commentators' who do double-duty at Fox TV, like Mara Liasson and Juan Williams.

When NPR first announced Edwards' dismissal, it was claimed 'Beginning in May 2004, NPR's Steve Inskeep will co-host the program from Washington, DC, and NPR's Renee Montagne will share hosting duties from the NPR West studios in Culver City.' Renee Montagne has been little heard from of late, however. In any event, no one has yet to explain why an early morning news and feature program that depends on multiple far-flug correspondents and interviewees is improved rather than needlessly complicated by a dual-coast hosting arrangement. (It puts me in mind of the Chicago Cubs' disastrous experiment with the College of Coaches and likely will come to the same ugly ending.)

As Emerson put it, sometimes 'money costs too much'.

The story NPR is sure never to cover now looks to be getting bigger and more interesting. FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting) has just released an updated study of NPR. The findings are disturbingly suggestive:

FAIR�s study recorded every on-air source quoted in June 2003 on four National Public Radio news shows: All Things Considered, Morning Edition, Weekend Edition Saturday and Week-end Edition Sunday. Each source was classified by occupation, gender, nationality and partisan affiliation. Altogether, the study counted 2,334 quoted sources, featured in 804 stories.

* * *

Elite sources dominated NPR�s guest-list. These sources�including government officials, professional experts and corporate representatives�accounted for 64 percent of all sources

* * *

Sources identified as workers on NPR programming in June accounted for 2.3 percent of overall sources and 1.8 percent of U.S. sources. But spokespersons for organized labor were almost invisible, numbering just six sources, or 0.3 percent of the total.

* * *

Women were dramatically underrepresented on NPR in 1993 (19 percent of all sources), and they remain so today (21 percent).

* * *

Looking at partisan sources�including government officials, party officials, campaign workers and consultants�Republicans outnumbered Democrats by more than 3 to 2 (61 percent to 38 percent). A majority of Republican sources when the GOP controls the White House and Congress may not be surprising, but Republicans held a similar though slightly smaller edge (57 percent to 42 percent) in 1993, when Clinton was president and Democrats controlled both houses of Congress. And a lively race for the Democratic presidential nomination was beginning to heat up at the time of the 2003 study.

Tellingly, NPR's own ombudsman, Jeffrey Dvorkin, admits, 'The FAIR study seems about right to me with a couple of exceptions.'

So it would appear from Morning Edition changes that NPR, already overly weighted with Republican white males and conservative think tankers, is only going to get worse.

As for Bob Edwards, he's currently on a new book tour. Understandably, he's considering leaving NPR, as he told the Seattle Times. The interview, however, includes this intriguing -- and, for one who cares about NPR, alarming -- excerpt:

Q. Have you considered other jobs outside of NPR?
A. I'm listening. I think I owe it to myself and my family to listen.
Q. Ah, well, I guess you're in kind of a sensitive spot.
A. I'm in an extremely sensitive spot. And someday I can tell you how sensitive, but I can't tell you now.

Now, who or what in Washington do you suppose might cause Mr. Edwards to feel he's been put in an "extremely sensitive spot"?


Source:
http://www.theleftcoaster.com/archives/001945.php

[Triana]

5. So..they can't find enough hires from corprat-owned media eh?

I'd call that a good thing, given the state of the "news" media these days. Why BOTHER calling it National PUBLIC Radio when it's just going to be another Faux Snooze or another CNN - and is essentially corprat-owned just like all the rest.

I suspect they can't find enough CONSERVATIVEs who are available to fill their positions. Under the new ownership, I'm sure they mean to oust every damned REAL reporter, journalist or anyone who would DARE tell a truth (can't have that - it might upset the status quo!).

I quit contributing a couple years ago and told them I'd refuse until they dumped Cokie Roberts. She's still on there yapping like a spoilt poodle every damn week. And now, they're just taking on more and more like her.

Hmph. I ain't sending them a stinkin plug nickel until they clean up their act. Which I suspect will be NEVER.

[Demit]

6. Bill Marimow is a good guy—was forced out of the Baltimore Sun in 2004

This article from the American Journalism Review is a good recap of what happened, and similar to what I bet happened at NPR. Marimow tries, apparently, but just can't be the good company man that puts profits above all else. His journalism instincts and identification with his reporters keep popping up.

"...The editor's beheading triggered newsroom fears of yet more dramatic incursions by the bean counters. Some voiced concern over the fate of the paper's foreign bureaus. And some were apprehensive about broader ramifications. "The Tribune is a profit-oriented company, and higher profits are not always compatible with good journalism," Sun reporter Scott Shane told the Washington Post. "Marimow was very protective of the newsroom and good journalism. A lot of us were fearful that something like this might be on the way."..."
http://www.ajr.org/article.asp?id=3520

[DeepModem Mom]

8. Thanks for this info, Dem. nt

[Joe Bacon]

7. Pull the plug on NPR and PBS

After reading FAIR, The Daily Howler, and Media Matters documentation of the overwhelming right wing bias in NPR and PBS, I stopped supporting them. I'm tired of financing Republican Propaganda. Pull the plug on 'em. Let Jim Liar, Mara Liasson and Juan Williams work for a change instead of living the good life with our tax dollars

[japple]

9. I've noticed a subtle shift in the past few months in the reporting

at NPR, and this may be the reason Mr. Marimow has been fired. Some of the reporters who have been there a long time are pretty liberal and have just been biding their time until things turn around politically. Cokie Roberts is a huge exception. I remember that in 1970s, she was a pretty good reporter, but now she is a shill, and a personal friend of the Donald Rumsfields. The other programming on NPR is why I keep listening and supporting it. I support my local NPR affiliate as well because that's the only place where I can hear Ira Glass, Jazz with Bob Parlochan, not to mention Weekend With Bob Edwards, plus truly independent programming. The businesses and people in the Chattanooga area who support WUTC are progressive, involved citizens and most of us are just biding our time until the tide turns.