What we have come to.....

Holy shit they didn't just fire Keillor, they're also scrubbing all the old Prairie Home broadcasts and *renaming the show* https://t.co/kKPgKCg9W5 pic.twitter.com/RKmFM31T1h

— Christopher Ingraham (@_cingraham) November 29, 2017

Really?

WaPo:

After we published this column, Minnesota Public Radio announced it was terminating its contracts with Garrison Keillor due to "allegations of his inappropriate behavior with an individual who worked for him."  The Post takes these allegations seriously and is seeking more information about them."

What happened?  Well actually, nobody knows:

Keillor told The Associated Press of his firing in an email. In a follow-up statement, he said he was fired over “a story that I think is more interesting and more complicated than the version MPR heard.” He didn’t give details of the allegation.

“It’s some sort of poetic irony to be knocked off the air by a story, having told so many of them myself, but I’m 75 and don’t have any interest in arguing about this. And I cannot in conscience bring danger to a great organization I’ve worked hard for since 1969,” Keillor said.

“A person could not hope for more than what I was given,” he said.

Minnesota Public Radio confirmed Keillor had been fired, saying it received a single allegation of “inappropriate behavior” and doesn’t know of any other similar allegations. MPR said it was notified of the allegation last month and that it stemmed from Keillor’s conduct when he was responsible for producing “A Prairie Home Companion.”

And what was the column to which this editorial note was appended? An opinion piece that opens with this quote:

"It's slippery ground, in general, to judge past actions by present standards and with a benefit of hindsight that is, morally, highly questionable."

And goes on to discuss, among other prominent persons, the President of the United States (we only have one at a time), and Sen. Al Franken.  Of the proposed (or demanded) resignation of Sen. Franken Mr. Keillor has this to say:

This is pure absurdity, and the atrocity it leads to is a code of public deadliness.  No kidding. 

No word yet on whether any of the editors of the Washington Post have been required to review the definition of "irony," and consider how it applies here.  But considering Mr. Keillor is not accused of the sins of Adolf Hitler, or even of David Duke, much less Donald Trump, it seems a bit disturbing that his words, which only come to Sen. Franken's situation in the final paragraphs, should be deemed so guilty by association with the allegation against Mr. Keillor, that the WaPo editorial board must wash its hands of them even as it leaves them available on-line and in print.

What's next?

*Now we do:

In an email to the Star Tribune Wednesday, Keillor said, “I put my hand on a woman’s bare back. I meant to pat her back after she told me about her unhappiness and her shirt was open and my hand went up it about six inches. She recoiled. I apologized. I sent her an email of apology later and she replied that she had forgiven me and not to think about it. We were friends. We continued to be friendly right up until her lawyer called.”

Keillor even managed a joke of sorts: “Getting fired is a real distinction in broadcasting and I’ve waited fifty years for the honor. All of my heroes got fired. I only wish it could’ve been for something more heroic.”

Then he turned more serious: “Anyone who ever was around my show can tell you that I was the least physically affectionate person in the building. Actors hug, musicians hug, people were embracing every Saturday night left and right, and I stood off in the corner like a stone statue.

“If I had a dollar for every woman who asked to take a selfie with me and who slipped an arm around me and let it drift down below the beltline, I’d have at least a hundred dollars. So this is poetic irony of a high order. But I’m just fine. I had a good long run and am grateful for it and for everything else.”

And I don't know if this is meant to be snark or in the same mode as the WaPo editorial note, but it's out there:

#npr pic.twitter.com/RJc4RhHsmr

— The Other Rene (@theotherrene) November 29, 2017

The MPR statement says, in part:

Last month, MPR was notified of the allegations which relate to Mr. Keillor's conduct while he was responsible for the production of A Prairie Home Companion (APHC). MPR President Jon McTaggart immediately informed the MPR Board Chair, and a special Board committee was appointed to provide oversight and ongoing counsel.

In addition, MPR retained an outside law firm to conduct an independent investigation of the allegations. Based on what we currently know, there are no similar allegations involving other staff. 

And there's already speculation like this:

Considering Keillor’s immense popularity among public radio diehards, this dramatic break suggests that the allegations against Keillor are severe.

Because sure, there's no hysteria in the entertainment industry right now, or in any NPR-related entity whatsoever.

And MPR scrubbing all PHC programs from broadcast and renaming the show currently on the air is not ironic in light of Keillor's WaPo column mostly about renaming things because we no longer like the people they are named for.  No matter; punishment must be meted out so we can all feel good about ourselves again.  Well, so some of us can.  Because, as Slate said, in a line of argument that only underlines the WaPo column's argument:

Keillor once brought up the scourge of sexual harassment in an odd address at the National Press Club in 1994. “We should be careful…not to make the world so fine and good that you and I can’t enjoy living in it,” he said. “A world in which there is no sexual harassment at all is a world in which there will not be any flirtation.” He made the same joke in his 2006 book, Homegrown Democrat. Keillor has not yet indicated whether the “interesting” and “complicated” situation that led to his firing involved flirtation, sexual harassment, or both.

There's a cartoon of Lucy handing Snoopy her balloon to keep safe while she goes inside for lunch.  Snoopy clamps it in his jaws, falls asleep sitting up, yawns, and releases it into the wild blue yonder.  The last panel shows Snoopy walking down the railroad tracks in the moonlight, his bindlestiff on his shoulder, thinking:  "Make one mistake and you pay for it the rest of your life."

A world that is long on punishment and resentment and short on forgiveness and self-examination ("let he who is without sin....") is not a world I want to live in; though for the most part, I have to.