Caught in a lie. Brian Williams
 

In this age of transparency and tracking and cameras and world "eyes" not many can get away with fibs for long, especially if you are in the public eye.

What do you think about this situation?

Quotes:
A mistake in recalling the events of 12 years ago..........

"I said I was traveling in an aircraft that was hit by (enemy) fire," he said. "Instead, I was in the following aircraft."

I don't think it was just a mistake in recalling the events............he knew what he was saying, what he did or did not do we years ago.

I am shocked at this. I just wonder WHY....WHY would someone like him do this, assuming he has and it sure looks as if the charges are valid.

Remember the day when the anchor on the new was trusted ? Dan Rather and his rather pathetic attempt to get Bush is the first thing I think of as that might have been the first of the cracking of confidence in these guys.

We now hear there may be more incidents, and it has to give you pause. I have been suspicious of ALL media for a number of years now, and rely on them, and that includes cable news folks, for absolutely nothing. I do my own research and do my own fact checking. That way I can ignore spin, character attacks and concentrate on what is REALLY happening.

At least Walter Cronkite never claimed to be reporting from the moon.

Damages his credibility as the news anchor but:


John 8:7 King James Version (KJV)

"So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her."

I was going to write my thoughts on this topic, but I misremembered. Guess my brain cells are getting conflated.

Glad I'm not a working news anchor and simply a retired guy in TV.

Since he invented the computer, maybe we can forgive this lie.


:super:

"At least Walter Cronkite never claimed to be reporting from the moon."

lol - thanks Buzzy!

Proof positive!

and...

It is interesting, accident victims, and assault victims have many times been shown to remember things wrong when there is a video showing what actually happened. I have experienced similar occurrences during a close call when there were other people in the car, each had a slightly different story.
So during a helicopter ride, in a war, with shooting going on, I would cut the guy a break, especially with the several years that have gone by.
I look at it this way, there were some questions asked now, going forward, everyone involved is going to be doubly sure they are correct, too much at stake.
Just my humble opinion.

He screwed up and it will cost him his career. Believe me, if he had come under fire he would have remembered it and the evasive maneuvers the chopper would take. I liked him too. The last honest newsman we had was of course Cronkite and before that Murrow or maybe Huntley Brinkley. Today all news is slanted by owners opinions and talking points reinforced throughout the day!

but he said when he was a teenage volunteer firefighter (never knew there was such a thing) he crawled on his hands and knees and rescued a puppy, which later became two puppies when he retold the story. I'm not kidding.

This is another nail in the mainstream media coffin.

Brian Williams Lied.
He repeated the lie several times.
He was not on the plane or even in the same sortie
I understand that he arrived on a flight an hour or more after the incident.
He then equivocated when caught and tried to claim that his memory was "fuzzy". That is truly Bovine Scatology.

He could have shut this down quickly if his apology had been honest, sincere and unembelished.

When will offenders learn that lesson?

Brian Williams reporting was so slanted that i am surprised that people are surprised regarding his embellishments about his trip to a war zone. As I recall Hillary said something similar.

Walter Cronkite, whom I respected, is the reason better than 80% of journalist have a heavily leaning liberal bias.

I believe journalist like jurist need to remove as much of their bias as is humanly possible in order to be objective in their opinions. However it seems that this once sacred practice has disappeared and in many instances so has the sacred practice of ethical reporting.

Let's not forget his Katrina report of a body floating by his hotel in a mostly dry French Quarter district. In his anchor position, he doesn't have the leeway to embellish and skew the facts for any reason. We expect more from our news people, but maybe that is our fault. No, I don't believe Brian Williams will survive this. Nor should he.

It actually makes no difference to me if he said his helicopter got hit or not. We all have to take the television news with a grain of salt. He was trying to make it seem that his network went that extra step.

Brian Williams is not the first news anchor to fabricate sidebars to actuality nor will he be the last.

Google and you can see how Meagan Kelley and Sean Hannity have both been caught stretching the facts.

Not defending anyone here, BUT the two folks you mention from Fox are NOT newscasters. They do NOT report, but comment on news. Williams reports news and as such has a much higher standard.

Your confusion about this is the basis for much of our ill informed electorate. It is a serious one, as no one should tune into either of those you mention OR Rachael Maddow or many on CNN for NEWS.

NOT knowing this difference is a very serious flaw.

Journalism is about getting the facts and reporting them accurately.

I don't know what we are subjected to anymore, but it isn't that. The talking heads opine and edit and just plain lie sometimes. But mostly they take us all down a myriad of primrose paths. They change the subject and they omit and they varnish. I can't think of one who doesn't.

I really wish our reporters would do just that -- report the news. I don't want giggles. I don't want your version. I don't want your personal stories. Just the facts, thank you very much. I'm a big girl and will ingest those facts as I see fit.

Commentators are free to say what they will, so long as they let people know these are their opinions. Again, I'll listen and decide on my own.

This is why I like Al Jazeera America. I know when I am listening to news and when I am hearing opinions. Their news really does seem to be based on facts. When needed, both sides of the coin are given. When it is conjecture, whether by the reporter or a statesman or someone on the streets, they let you know.

As to Mr. Williams, he got hung by his own petard. For now, he has taken a leave of absence since he supposedly doesn't want to be the story. I hope he doesn't come back. We deserve better.

I find Al Jazerra to be the best "News" outlet on TV

That from a right of center ,white, protestant , anglo with a military background. NEVER THOUGHT THAT I WOULD BE SAYING THAT:ohdear:

What I find very disconcerting is that people watch the various cable "news" channels and consider that they are actually watching new. Oh, they get a smattering which is manipulated by editors to omit, embellish, and move the story to the direction they want.

The post above alluding to a certain cable channel, and folks on there "stretching the facts" really concerns me because people believe they are actually watching news.

It is difficult today, to get facts and takes more work than it should.

Have only "tested" Al Jazzeera but will revisit, however they are not immune...

"One and a half years ago, Suliman, 42, re-set his watch to German time, having become disenchanted with Al-Jazeera. And it wasn't just because the broadcaster seemed less interested in reports from Europe. Rather, Suliman had the feeling that he was no longer being allowed to work as an independent journalist.

Last August, he quit his job. "Before the beginning of the Arab Spring, we were a voice for change," he says, "a platform for critics and political activists throughout the region. Now, Al-Jazeera has become a propaganda broadcaster."

Suliman is not the only one who feels bitterly disappointed. The Arab TV network has recently suffered an exodus of prominent staff members. Reporters and anchors in cities like Paris, London, Moscow, Beirut and Cairo have left Al-Jazeera, despite what are seen as luxurious working conditions in centrally located offices. And despite the fact that the network is investing an estimated $500 million (€375 million) in the US, so as to reach even more viewers on the world's largest television market -- one in which its biggest competitor, CNN, is at home.

Al Jazeera Criticized for Lack of Independence after Arab Spring - SPIEGEL ONLINE

PS....this link goes back a year and half ago, so perhaps the situation is cured...if so I apologize and am willing to delete. Just showing that they all get accused. I will begin to watch...just tracked down the channel number

:bigbow::bigbow::bigbow:

NBC PLAN to save Brian Williams


NBC's big dilemma is the fact that Brian Williams is number one in his time slot by a wide margin, and they really don't have anybody ready to take over. So they will take a wait-and-see attitude while Lester Holt fills in this week.

He violated his position's rules.
He violated the trust of his followers.
He needs to be removed.

It will be very surprising and in fact revealing if he is allowed to return.....number one or not....wrong is wrong. His value cannot be the same to the listening public anymore.

Please limit your comments to the Brian Williams story. Many posts have been removed/hidden that delved into politics or were otherwise off topic. General discussion about media and their coverage of politics should be conducted in the political forum.

Thread will be closed if the tangents persist.

There are things I remember vividly from my childhood that my brothers say never happened. So I think memory can be a tricky thing.

If NBC doesn't have a succession plan, shame on them. Lester Holt is excellent IMHO.

Remember the panic of the Orson Wells broadcast War of the Worlds.

"But in the end, there was no massive panic and the spike in calls to the police is one of the few bits of evidence we have that at least a small percentage of the listeners had concerns or complaints over the broadcast. Quite simply, newspapers created the “panic” after the fact (including U.S. newspapers writing nearly 13,000 articles on it over the next month), the public swallowed up the newspaper’s reports, and radio and CBS particularly were happy to embrace the claims as a demonstration of the power of the new medium, which was good for advertising dollars and ratings."

Who knows whats true? Who knows who is pulling the strings?

I heard an NPR show that I can't find. The Doctor was saying if you lie to a child when they are five 3 times it gets recorded in their memory. The example he used was telling a child if they remember the scary clown that visited the class. The first time the child is asked they say no, the second time they say maybe and the third time they remember. He said that's it not unusual that people see the same event and remember it differently.

And some people lie, especially if it's in their best interest.

nothing new

Not sure I understand this post. You are comparing a radio fictional show to a newscaster, who recently became number 1 and is charged with REPORTING NEWS ??????

And you say "nothing new". What other NEWS BROADCASTER can you share that has lied ?

After the show the newspapers and radio news broadcast made the point that this fictional story caused real panic when it did not. That's the lie.

I don't have any broadcasters to share with you. Therefore he must be the only one that ever lied.

I assume there was once a time when journalists were impartial and genuinely wanted to tell the truth. These days, news readers on the networks and cable news outlets are paid so much money that it becomes much more about personality than it does about journalistic integrity. These guys and gals have to become self-promoters in order to get the best jobs. I wonder if this didn't have something to do with Williams' twisting of the facts.

He's got to go but I suspect they'll never find a truly impartial and honest replacement. NBC may not even want to find a real journalist...too much money involved. Maybe we'll see a Kardashian behind the news desk one of these days.

About the only thing we can do is access as many news sources as possible and then try to sift through it all to find the truth.

To me he was very likeable even though I didn't agree with his liberal views. It was reported today that he was making 10 million per year so he won't be visiting food kitchens if he get dumped which I think he should.
If not, how can he have any credibility with viewers that know he lied several times not to mention the ones that were not caught?

In what venue did Williams tell his story? Rather told his on his news show. Where did Williams tell his? And what exactly did he say, and what according to others was the true story? If a newsman tells a story to the Kiwanis club with embellishment, does that mean that when he is on the air he is not accurately reporting the news? Did CNN report that in fact his helicopter was also fired upon but not the main target of the attack? I have not found those details and wish someone would post them here

Timeline in this link and if you google Brian Williams you will get pages and pages of stories and links

How Brian Williams' Iraq story changed - Feb. 5, 2015

Gabriel Heater and the News! The real McCoy (ahh, Heater)

And this guy gets paid millions not to be "misremembering! Kind of makes you lose faith in all of these newscasters who are nothing more than actors, paid to look good.

I dont know....but will share a few things...

from Wiki...

"Producer John Houseman noticed that at about 8:32 p.m. ET, CBS supervisor Davidson Taylor received a telephone call in the control room. Creasing his lips, Taylor left the studio and returned four minutes later, "pale as death". He had been ordered to interrupt "The War of the Worlds" broadcast immediately with an announcement of the program's fictional content, but by that time actor Ray Collins was choking on the roof of Broadcasting Building and the break was less than a minute away. During the sign-off theme the phone began ringing. Houseman picked it up and the furious caller announced he was mayor of a Midwestern town where mobs were in the streets. Houseman hung up quickly: "For we were off the air now and the studio door had burst open."[3]:404

The following hours were a nightmare. The building was suddenly full of people and dark-blue uniforms. Hustled out of the studio, we were locked into a small back office on another floor. Here we sat incommunicado while network employees were busily collecting, destroying or locking up all scripts and records of the broadcast. Finally the Press was let loose upon us, ravening for horror. How many deaths had we heard of? (Implying they knew of thousands.) What did we know of the fatal stampede in a Jersey hall? (Implying it was one of many.) What traffic deaths? (The ditches must be choked with corpses.) The suicides? (Haven't you heard about the one on Riverside Drive?) It is all quite vague in my memory and quite terrible.[3]:404

Paul White, head of CBS News, was quickly summoned to the office — "and there bedlam reigned", he wrote:

The telephone switchboard, a vast sea of light, could handle only a fraction of incoming calls. The haggard Welles sat alone and despondent. "I'm through," he lamented, "washed up." I didn't bother to reply to this highly inaccurate self-appraisal. I was too busy writing explanations to put on the air, reassuring the audience that it was safe. I also answered my share of incessant telephone calls, many of them from as far away as the Pacific Coast.[21]:47–48

The War of the Worlds (radio drama) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I have seen a few places..that rag Slate for one...who just need to vent on everything who question everything BUT

Bottom line is that in my opinion, there is NO...NONE relationship. The Williams story is important as it it REAL, not some fictional story. This is a man responsible to deliver NEWS to the nation.....REAL NEWS, and the on thing that is a model for that person is to be trusted. Once the public does not trust you, it is over.

I like Brian Williams. Truth be known, WE ALL HAVE A SKELETON (we've all lied about something, haven't we?) IN THE CLOSET. Those that are wanting to tar and feather him, quit riding your high horses and take a chill pill. His lie was a little bit more high profile than yours, but, when it comes down to it, it was just a lie.