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Brian Williams

Wolff: For goodness sake, bring back Brian Williams

Michael Wolff
USA TODAY
NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams.

The Brian Williams controversy, which has resulted in his suspension, investigative articles in Vanity Fair and New Yorkmagazine, management upheaval at NBC News and the loss of first place status for its evening news show, is a long way from over.

It has come to be about the culture of NBC's parent, Comcast, and its abilities to lead a talent organization, and about the condition of media commentary, a closed loop that, for many, it is impossible to see beyond. In this, Brian Williams and NBC News seem hopelessly stuck, without a clear exit strategy from the three-month-old mess and continuous leaks like the ones over the weekend coming from within the company.

Williams, of course, exaggerated his war reporting exploits, establishing a trail of bluster and self-promotion that may or may not have damaged his credibility as a network news anchor. That's the confusing issue: Does Williams' fate and future have to do with how the evening news audience sees him, or is it more about how the media sees itself? If it's the former, how are the audience's views to be measured? If it's the latter, what exactly are the standards by which he is being judged, both inside and outside NBC, and in whose interests is the judgment being made?

The early discussion of Williams credibility issue was strongly influenced by a report by a marketing consulting firm, Marketing Arm, which The New York Times called "sobering." Before the controversy began, Williams was #23 on the firm's "most trusted" list; immediately afterward he was #835. The Times characterized this as "an index" that's "closely watched by advertisers and media and marketing executives."

It could also be characterized as a promotional tool for a small marketing firm assembled with little statistical rigor whose methodology no one at the Times or any of the myriad other outlets that picked up the report took the time or had the interest to pursue. That is, it's as likely to be bunk as meaningful. (Several confidential studies making the rounds based on social media data in fact show the exact opposite result: strongly pro-Williams or happily I-don't-care, with a low level of interest in the story itself outside of people connected to the media industry.)

Still, without any clear audience measure, the commentariat view — theoretically, on the audience's behalf — has hardened against him. He lied. Ipso facto, America and the evening news audience no longer trust him. Or, even if the audience's doubtfulness cannot be proved, just on the basis of his evident moral lapse (and if he lied about one thing, changes are he lied about other things), he does not, by a widespread consensus about proper PR strategy as well as general high mindedness, deserve his job.

This is in contrast to Fox anchor Bill O'Reilly's various fabrications. Fox News, vastly more successful than any other television news organization, is singularly — some might say blatantly — in thrall to the loyalties of its audience, which, in spite of his sins, seems fine with O'Reilly. Indeed, O'Reilly's boss, Roger Ailes, is famously focused on managing his news organization to the desires of its audience and, as part of that mission, resisting the complaints of the commentariat, which he sees as not only remote from audience concerns but largely ignorant of the true workings of successful television.

Bill O'Reilly.

NBC, lacking Fox's strong management, seems unable to defend its own interests (or even to quite know what they are), and is riven by many internal factions competing for power and standing. Comcast is not a natural manager of talent, and has imposed at NBC many layers of management between it and the news division. Those managers were reportedly both resentful of the power of the talent (most specifically, Williams and Matt Lauer at the Today show, a strong Williams supporter) and in fear of being blamed for not handling the talent. (And, indeed, the head of the news division was replaced in the Williams affair.)

One byproduct of the Williams mess and of the competing power centers at NBC has been the New York magazine and Vanity Fair articles, each, arguably, more reflective of an organization at war with itself — a war that continued this week with new leaks — than of Williams' standing with the audience or his value to the network.

There are too a set of curious and unexamined assumptions that have come, via the commentariat, to frame the debate. Foremost among these is that an anchorman ought to be synonymous with probity — and that this probity creates credibility. As, arguably, anchor credibility comes from familiarity, mien and general comfort in the role of anchor. The evening news audience, or what remains of it, seems to understand that the evening news is less about journalism than about constancy, a predictable and soothing background noise. Indeed, the illusory nature, and fundamental shallowness, of an anchorman is a time-honored cultural trope.

So why now recast him otherwise? What is gained by the sudden insistence that a network anchorman represents the highest standards of journalism?

The commentariat is of course well aware that network news divisions are mere shadows of their former selves, once deep and well-resourced news originations reduced, in effect, to an on-air front man. Is that now the point? Williams must be sacrificed in an effort to maintain the network news fiction about gravitas and journalistic stature and credibility, a fiction far larger than Williams' own tall tales?

Or is this about a deep anger having to do with the fact that Williams has too successfully played this role? (Williams' tall tales of course derive from the effort to maintain this fiction.) He and the pretend state of television news are being angrily unmasked. In an industry best characterized by disappointment and lost stature, why should Williams be happy and respected?

There might seem to be no going back. The long-simmering demons of the television news businesses are once more out in the open, and the tailspin can only continue. Or, possibly, to the audience's satisfaction if not the commentariat's, you might actually let the show contentedly run out its years simply by bringing Williams back.

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