I originally thought I’d just add this to the preceding post as an update, but Vivian Schiller’s claim really deserves a thread all of its own.  While Ron Schiller [see updates] dines with sharia activists and calls conservatives, Republicans, and Tea Party activists “seriously racist people … gun toting … xenophobes”, Vivian insisted that many of the network’s critics believe they are too conservative themselves:

National Public Radio chief Vivian Schiller issued a flat denial Monday when asked whether NPR consistently puts a liberal spin on the news.

NPR strains to offer “journalism that presents no particular bias,” Schiller claimed in a speech at the National Press Club. And far from being the bastion of liberalism its critics insist, Schiller claimed that NPR gets “a tremendous amount of criticism for being too conservative.”

Lachlan Markay offers a few examples from their NPR archives of this conservative bias in action, so be sure to follow the link.  The Daily Caller reports on the same speech, where Chris Moody catches Vivian’s explanation of independence, NPR-style:

Critics of NPR’s subsidies argue that the government should not play a role in funding news outlets, especially ones that cover it. But Schiller contended that it is just that — government funding — that helps keep NPR independent.

“The fact that we have four sources of revenue: Listeners, philanthropy, corporate, and government, helps ensure that public media is not beholden to any one source of revenue,” she said. “Indeed, it is through this diversity of funding that we are able to maintain our journalistic independence.”

Got that?  It’s the very fact that NPR couldn’t exist without government funding that makes them independent of government!  And Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia, Winston.

Forget the issue of funding for just a moment.  The two Schillers at the top of NPR apparently can’t tell the truth even if it tasted like filet mignon.  Dependence is independence, the Joooooos run the newspapers, and conservatives are all racists in their world.  Why would anyone rely on news from an organization run by these two Orwellian creatures?

Update: According to biographical sources, Vivian Schiller is the daughter of a Ronald Schiller, a former editor at Reader’s Digest, which I mistakenly read as being married to a Ronald Schiller.  I’ve removed the spousal reference and apologize for the error.

Update II: It’s not the first time the confusion has arisen about the two Schillers.  NPR put out a press release in December explaining that the two are not related.