A Maine man is in jail on federal charges that he threatened to kill or harm Melissa Block and Guy Raz, hosts of NPR’s All Things Considered, the Smoking Gun website is reporting. According to an FBI affidavit, John Crosby sent more than 20 bizarre and often threatening messages to NPR through its “Contact Us” website form. NPR contacted the FBI on Jan. 17 after Crosby allegedly described Block in a message as “an annoying [expletive] who is helping to destroy me to use me as a human sacrifice. She will be raped, beaten, tortured, and murdered very soon.” A Jan.

On a party-line vote, the House Committee on Rules today (March 16) voted 6-5 to allow H.R. 1076, which would ban federal funding to be used for NPR programming, to proceed to a floor vote on Thursday. No amendments are allowed. Members will have one hour for debate, controlled by Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) and Ranking Member Henry Waxman (D-Calif.).

A Prairie Home Companion host Garrison Keillor, 68, has announced that he plans to retire in the spring of 2013. He tells the AARP Bulletin that he must find his replacement first. “I’m pushing forward, and also I’m in denial,” he says. “It’s an interesting time of life.” Keillor created the show in 1974 in Minnesota. It is now distributed by American Public Media to 590 public radio stations across the country, and heard by more than 4 million people each week. As for his legacy, “I just want people in St. Paul and Minneapolis to feel that I was some sort of community asset and not a big embarrassment.

Juan Williams, writing on the Fox News website, wants to see NPR defunded. What NPR exec Ron Schiller said in the recent video sting “is just an open microphone on what I’ve been hearing from NPR top executives and editors for years. They are willing to do anything in service to any liberal with money and then they will turn around and in self-righteous indignation claim that they have cleaner hands than anybody in the news business who accepts advertising or expresses a point of view.” “The work of NPR’s many outstanding journalists is barely an afterthought to leadership with this mindset and obsessed with funding,” he says.

Peter Osnos of the progressive Century Foundation has discovered an upside in all the recent NPR turmoil. It’s “the likelihood that, for the first time, many more people among NPR and public radio’s devoted audience of over 34 million across the country will have a clearer understanding of how the system works.” Osnos, writing today (March 16), is a senior fellow at Century who focuses on media coverage of politics and policy.

Rick Moyers, writing in the Chronicle of Philanthropy, says in the wake of NPR President Vivian Schiller’s resignation, the NPR Board needs to ask itself two questions: Are we clear about our mission? And, given our mission, do we have the right board? “All nonprofit organizations need different boards at different stages of their growth and development and need clarity about their missions,” Moyers writes. “Failure to answer these questions head-on leads to organizations that are hard to govern and difficult to lead. Just ask Vivian Schiller.” Moyers is vice president of programs and communications at the Eugene and Agnes E.

Conservative video muckracker James O’Keefe, who caught NPR execs in an undercover sting last week, is seeking nonprofit status for his Project Veritas, “but it is certain that his application is not clear-cut, tax lawyers say,” according to today’s (March 16) Chronicle of Philanthropy. The main problem: O’Keefe pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor after he and three others entered the New Orleans office of Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-La.) last year pretending to be telephone repairmen. O’Keefe later stated that he would do it again, albeit “differently,” the paper notes. Marc Owens, a Washington tax lawyer who formerly oversaw the IRS division that monitors tax-exempt groups, noted: “If he is proposing to do something that is, in fact, illegal, can the IRS believe, with any degree of credibility, what he is saying?”

Jim Seaver, host of one of radio’s longest-running shows, Opera is My Hobby, on Kansas Public Radio, died March 14 in Lawrence, Kan. He was 92. The show’s debut was Sept. 19, 1952, just four days after KANU (now Kansas Public Radio) signed on the air. Seaver produced his last show a week ago and was thinking of the program up until the day he died, KPR general manager Janet Campbell told the Lawrence Journal World. “It was more than a hobby, even though that is what he called it,” she said. He continued to produce the show as a volunteer until his hospitalization on March 11.

The National Center for Community Engagement is highlighting an interesting outreach project today (March 16) on its blog. Since last summer, WDET-FM’s Truck Stop has been encouraging citizens to help use anonymous text messaging to report illegal truck driving in low income and marginalized communities. The station is also partnering with a local community action group to fight blight in the city.

Craig Aaron, new managing director of the Free Press media reform organization, posted a column on Huffington Post after presenting 1.2 million signatures collected by his group, MoveOn.org and CREDO Action, on Cap Hill today (March 15). “Unfortunately,” he wrote, “there are those out there, even inside public media’s institutions, who tell organizations like MoveOn.org and Free Press to keep it down. They would rather we stayed below the radar. They seem to think they can appease their attackers by lying low or even offering up a few ‘scalps’ (to quote one insider involved in the dismissal of NPR’s Vivian Schiller).

Sesame Street actors joined members of Congress and activists in a rally on Cap Hill today (March 15) where advocacy groups presented 1.2 million signatures to save public broadcasting funding. Cast members from the iconic children’s show described how the made a personal impact on their lives — and livelihood. “It has changed all of us and has given us as artists a place to work with such pride,” said Roscoe Orman, who has portrayed Gordon Robinson since 1973.

Frontline has hired former Yahoo! News blog editor Andrew Golis as its director of digital media/senior editor. He’ll oversee integration of the Frontline broadcast, Web and new media initiatives. At Yahoo! News, Golis built a network of nonpartisan reporting blogs, including the Upshot, which received 100 million page views after just six months in operation.

Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) sent a “Dear Colleague” letter today (March 15) alerting members of Congress to press coverage that last week’s undercover video sting of NPR executives was edited in a misleading manner, citing stories from the Associated Press and on conservative TV host Glenn Beck’s website. “Recently, members of the media and Congress have paid great attention to a hidden-camera video taken of National Public Radio (NPR) fundraisers by activists working for James O’Keefe,” the letter reads. “I wanted to bring to your attention analysis conducted by experts in video editing and journalistic ethics, as well as a broad range of conservative media figures..

Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.) today (March 15) introduced H.R. 1076 (PDF), an updated version of his previous bill to ban federal funds from being used on public radio programming. The latest bill now specifically prohibits “funding of National Public Radio and radio content acquisition,” and also bans using any federal funds to pay NPR dues. The House Rules Committee also just announced an emergency meeting for 3 p.m. Wednesday to consider the bill; that must take place before any floor action on Thursday.

Beth Kirsch is the new vice president and executive producer of digital media content for the Hispanic Information and Telecommunications Network (HITN). She’ll oversee the $30 Million 2010 Ready to Learn Project LAMP (Learning Apps Media Partnership), recently awarded by the U.S. Department of Education to the network and two partners. Kirsch joins HITN from WGBH in Boston, where she’s worked since 1999 on shows including Between the Lions and Martha Speaks. “With more than 20 years of experience in public television, Kirsch brings expertise in educational media, animation, writing, editing, outreach and fundraising,” HITN said in a statement.