More lies by Brian Williams have turned up – this time about when he was reporting about Hurricane Katrina.
Excerpted from John Simerman\’s article for the New Orleans Advocate:
Williams\’ account of seeing a bodyfloat by in the French Quarter – which remained largely dry -and even a claim of catching dysentery from drinking Katrinafloodwaters have raised eyebrows among bloggers and elsewhere sincehe took it on the chin this week over a claim that he rode in ahelicopter that was downed by a rocket-propelled grenade in Iraq.
“Myweek, two weeks there was not helped by the fact that I accidentallyingested some of the floodwater. I became very sick with dysentery,our hotel was overrun with gangs, I was rescued in the stairwell of afive-star hotel in New Orleans by a young police officer. We arefriends to this day. And uh, it just was uh, I look back at totalagony.”
Butthe French Quarter, the original high ground of New Orleans, was notimpacted by the floodwaters that overwhelmed the vast majority of thecity.
And now, according to the New York Post\’s Page Six (which, FYI, is never, ever put on page 6 of the paper), no less an icon than NBC\’s former news anchor, Tom Brokaw, says Mr. Williams must leave or be fired. But NBC says no such thing is going to happen:
Brokaw,74, was still the “Nightly News” anchor when Williams came backfrom his Iraq expedition – and an insider said he knew the storyWilliams later spouted was bunk.
“TomBrokaw and [former NBC News President] Steve Capus knew this was afalse story for a long time and have been extremely uncomfortablewith it,” the source said.
NBCNews execs had counseled him to stop telling the tale.
Williamsstill took the anchor\’s seat for his “Nightly News” broadcastThursday evening – and was working at 30 Rock all day despite callsfor his dismissal. He didn\’t address the issue during thebroadcast.
“Heis not going to be suspended or reprimanded in any way. He has thefull support of NBC News,” a network source said.
I knew that Brian Williams did not say anything about this scandal because I made a point of watching the show last night. (I was amazed that he didn\’t. Does Mr. Williams think will just blow over?) But I didn\’t know that the falsity of the story had been out there for so long.
If the Page Six story is true, then there is no doubt that it was not some memory lapse: Williams knew the story was untrue and kept telling it anyway. No wonder Tom Brokaw – whose personal legacy is tied to NBC – wants him out.
Put this all together, and I do not see how Brian Williams can continue as NBC\’s news anchor.
The network\’s reputation has been shattered before – think of its doctoring of the audio tape which made George Zimmerman sound as though he singled out Trayvon Martin because he was Black, instead of simply answering the dispatcher\’s question about what Martin looked like. And when NBC has been caught, it – albeit probably grudgingly – does something about it.
The people who edited the Zimmerman tape were fired. I have little doubt that Mr. Williams will either agree to leave “voluntarily” or suffer a similar fate. Very, very soon.
