Windows Media cannot access streaming content

I’ve had Windows Media Player 11 installed for around a month now, but recently a problem cropped up where it refuses to access any form of streaming content.

Basically, anything in the library or MP3’s, etc. play fine, but when I go to NPR.org to hear the day’s news, the player just freezes. Bizarrely, it can be unlocked again by telling the system to play another MP3, and then it finally gets moving again and also pops up the error message:

“Windows Media Player cannot play the file. If the file is located on the Internet, connect to the Internet. If the file is located on a removable storage card, insert the storage card.”

I rooted around on Google and came up with this:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/306317/en-us
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/forpros/serve/firewall.aspx

I tried trouble-shooting like suggested by the Microsoft site and went to Run: mplayer2.

When I tried to stream the same NPR file, it quickly ran through all of the stitched-together WMA files for each news story and I got this set of errors:
“You do not have access to the location or file. (Error=80070005)”

So, I suspect that it’s not a WMP issue per se, but perhaps some sort of Firewall issue.

So, Dopers, any idea where to go from here?

Thanks,
threemae