NPR host fired for OWS (DC) involvement

gotta love the media...even NPR...


NPR host fired for OWS (DC) involvement

WASHINGTON — A freelance radio host was fired from a documentary program that airs on NPR affiliates because she helped organize a Washington protest, the host said Thursday, while the producers of another show defended her work and said she hasn't violated their policies. Lisa Simeone said she was fired Wednesday evening from "Soundprint," a documentary show that isn't produced by NPR but airs on about 35 affiliate stations across the country. The head of Soundprint Media Center Inc. cited NPR's code of ethics before she was fired. "In my mind, it's fine if you want to be a leader of an organized protest movement, but you can't also be in a journalistic role," Moira Rankin, president of Soundprint, told The Associated Press a day after she fired Simeone. "You can't be the host of a journalism program and plead that you are different than the reporter who is going to come on a minute after you introduce the program."

Rankin said she was alerted to Simeone serving as a protest spokeswoman by a radio programming director who airs the show. She said her Laurel, Md.-based production company had adopted NPR's code of ethics as its own in part because listeners don't know the difference between NPR headquarters and independent producers across the country. NPR also questioned Simeone's involvement in the protest near the White House, which began as an anti-war protest but also adopted what participants call an anti-corporate greed message. But NPR said Simeone doesn't work for the radio network, and it hadn't pressured Soundprint to fire her. Simeone also hosts "World of Opera," a show produced by North Carolina-based music and arts station WDAV. That program is distributed by NPR. She said that station is supporting her. "I don't cover news. In none of the shows that I do, do I cover the news," she told the AP. "What is NPR afraid I'll do? Insert a seditious comment into a synopsis of `Madame Butterfly?'"

so now...if you have any kind of public role...you better not occupy anywhere? i mean...c'mon! this is crap. i could see if she was like on air talking about how she was at the rally, raising *SNIP* and got arrested. but just for being there?