Brian Williams is inevitably going to be criticized by lots of couch-bound observers who have never reported from a war zone (including yours truly), but given the forces eager to pounce on any slip by the news organization he represents, he has committed perhaps the worst kind of self-inflicted wound.
The NBC anchor's faulty and seemingly self-aggrandizing "memory" about his stint reporting from Iraq in 2003 pushes enough hot buttons to create a perfect storm of bad publicity. And NBC News has once again looked tardy, at best, in formulating a PR strategy in response to bad news, as it was during transitions at "Today" and "Meet the Press."
Williams has benefited from coming across as a likable anchor - as comfortable throwing out one-liners on a talkshow as he is delivering the news. But he has stepped into the proverbial hornets' nest, for reasons both of his own making and beyond his control.
Williams' embellishment of his experience is particularly damaging coming from a journalist. Essentially, his account has reduced him to the role of unreliable witness, somebody whose version of an event was exposed as being significantly at odds with the facts.
But the real problem is that the story itself - dealing with the military - hands a cudgel to those already inclined to hold a grudge against or distrust NBC News, which explains the almost-gleeful tone of the coverage on Websites like The Drudge Report and Breitbart.com.
Part of that has nothing to do with Williams. NBC happens to be affiliated with MSNBC, whose liberal profile and politics has made it a favorite target of conservatives. Although the two operate separately, they are part of the same corporate family and share talent, allowing many to conflate NBC and MSNBC into a single entity, feeding the perception of a liberal "mainstream media" that can't be trusted.
Those same quadrants were positively overjoyed when Dan Rather was involved in a report about then-President George W. Bush's National Guard service that hastened his exit from CBS News. And while Williams is unlikely to experience anything that serious in terms of the fallout, there's no doubt this cloud will linger over him for a while and be used to discredit or diminish both NBC News and its anchorman the next time the division is involved in something that irks the usual suspects.
Thus far, Williams' explanation of why he would foul up the story sounds like more of an evasion than a response, which won't hasten making the controversy go away. Certainly, the 12-year time lapse hardly covers mixing up something as memorable as being aboard a helicopter that was actually forced to land after having been struck by ground fire.
Finally, there's NBC News, which after awkwardly mishandling baton passes at "Meet the Press" and "Today" needed to look decisive in either disciplining Williams or giving him a vote of confidence. Admittedly, the story keeps changing -- with a helicopter pilot backing up part of what Williams has said on Thursday -- but either way, a guy who looked like the least of the division's problems has now added to its woes.
There's an old saying that just because you're paranoid doesn't mean that people aren't out to get you. But in this case, the reverse also applies: Just because people are out to get you doesn't mean that they're automatically wrong. On that score, Williams' Iraq war story is the epitome of an unforced error by providing his critics, even the unfair ones, legitimate ammunition.
© 2015 Variety Media, LLC, a subsidiary of Penske Business Media; Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC
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