With NBC’s Brian Williams admitting to Stars and Stripes the phoniness of his story about being aboard a ‘copter downed by a rocket-propelled-grenade, we need to establish a new genre of literature. Why not call it Non-historical Fiction to distinguish it from Historical Fiction and to emphasize that it is also not just plain Fiction because it claims to be historical.
Williams pleads that he doesn’t know what caused him to ‘conflate’ episodes. He actually arrived at the site in Iraq in 2003 an hour or so after another ‘copter was, in fact, shot down, and interviewed members of the crew who were shot down. Maybe if he reflects upon his confusion long enough, he will come up with the moral rectitude to say, “Hell, I lied. I needed a good story.”
All of us expect O’Reilly, Hannity, Madow and Morning Joe to be entertainers, but it is embarrassing to us in the naive public to have to admit that we are not in Kansas anymore and that Edward R. Murrow and Cronkite are dead and gone. It seems that the school of journalism in Arizona named for the latter cannot produce real journalists fast enough to replace the likes of Williams.
Gwen Ifill and Judy Woodruff, please don’t disappoint us!
Sanchismos 
Makes me wonder about the entire lot of broadcasters!
Indeed, Lara, they’ve been entertainers for a very long time. I trust John Oliver and John Stewart as much as the network types because you know what satirists are up to. Broadcasters, not so much.
It’s sad that despite an illustrious career this is what Brian Williams will probably be remembered for. I wonder if it was a mid-life crisis kind of thing? There’s probably some psychological study that shows people are prone to believing, really believing somehow, that they did something brave and honorable when they didn’t. Maybe they feel their lives should reflect that somehow and it’s their way of compensating. Still….
Cindy, it seems there is some evidence that memory can be quite a fickle facility. Still though, one would think that a skilled newsperson would check his sources and doubly verify facts, even if he himself was the source. There were others aboard the stricken plane that he could have checked with years ago. But why check when the story played so well.
Ron –
You nailed it!
TOM
Thanks, Tom! Glad to hear you are doing well!
You are so right, er, correct. Where did all of the truth go? Why do so many people accept a twisted version of the truth? Why does credibility not matter any more? Why is fear being sold instead of the truth? Now you know why we don’t watch TV.
Fear is much more profitable than credibility or truth. I mean what is advertising, except propaganda aimed at increasing profits. Truth wounded or annihilated is a small price to pay for profits. That is a firm plank in the Grand Oligarch Party’s platform.
My TV watching is restricted to dramas done in Great Britain plus the NPR News Hour.
You, dear friend, nailed it again.
_____
I keep tryin’