Experts say Brian Williams’ ‘conflation’ could spell the end of his career

Brian Williams “misremembered.” He “conflated.” He was wrong, he says, about a story both he and NBC News repeated for years — the story of his helicopter being shot down in 2003, during the invasion of Iraq.

That’s a problem, say media experts, because Williams, anchor of “NBC Nightly News,” is the face of the broadcast, as well as managing editor, a key figure behind the scenes.

While some think a carefully handled investigation can help him ride out the botched story, many experts suggest that this incident could bring about the end of his storied career at NBC.

Williams, 55, grew up in Monmouth County, and has often cited his ordinary guy, Jersey roots in talking about his background. (In November, Bruce Springsteen helped induct Williams into the New Jersey Hall of Fame.) His admission of wrongdoing came as a complete shock to many yesterday, including Merrill Brown, who worked with Williams — then a news host on MSNBC — from the mid-1990s until 2002.

“I have no recollection of ever even thinking twice whether I or anyone else could ever trust Brian Williams,” said Brown, now the director of the School of Communication and Media at Montclair State University.

“The very next thing that has to happen is that he has to come clean and do so in some no-holds-barred setting,” Brown added.

Although he originally reported the 2003 incident accuratelyThe anchor revisited the story Friday on “NBC Nightly News” as part of a tribute to a veteran who he says ensured his safety that day. A report from Stars and Stripes, a newspaper that covers the military, quoted members of the armed forces present that day during the rocket fire who disputed Williams’ account, saying he was on a completely different helicopter.
Williams apologized on air Wednesday night, echoing an earlier Facebook apology, calling the recitation of the story “a bungled attempt” to honor a veteran.But that won’t be enough to save his job, Brown said. He thinks a press conference is in order — a chance for reporters to continue the line of questioning. NBC should conduct its own investigation into the matter, he adds, to turn over every stone and assure that there are no remaining discrepancies to be found.

“Perhaps in the meantime he should go on leave or be suspended in some fashion,” Brown said of Williams.

Yet Paul Levinson, professor of communication and media studies at Fordham University, still has faith in Williams’ ability to bounce back from “Conflategate.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it, but I think he probably will survive it,” he said.

The Facebook post where Williams apologized for his erroneous storyLevinson buys that Williams may have subconsciously reconstructed the events of that day in 2003. “When you retell a story often enough, sometimes it acquires a life of its own in your mind,” he said. Levinson, a former songwriter, remembers meeting John Lennon in an elevator, but over the years, lost the ability to recall specifically what was said during the encounter.

“It’s very tempting to unconsciously embellish the story,” he said. “Were I making that decision at NBC, I probably would keep him.”

When Williams repeated the story on-air again last week, he recited it with a knowing air, as though it were nothing but long-held narrative. But this wasn’t a story about meeting a celebrity — it was about a man ostensibly saving Williams’ life, and an embedded news reporter claiming part of the pilot’s spotlight.

‘I would think that his removal is inevitable,’ said Carl Hausman, professor of journalism at Rowan University.Today the pilot of the helicopter Williams was riding in told CNN that the helicopter was hit by small arms fire, but did say Williams had flubbed other details.

Philip Napoli, professor of media studies at Rutgers University, thinks Williams will likely “go the path of Dan Rather” following an NBC investigation.

Rather, for two decades the anchor of “CBS Evening News,” left the post in 2005, after his report about President George W. Bush’s Air National Guard service on “60 Minutes” was retracted.

Napoli calls the outing of Williams’ “conflation” a sign of the times. He said the incident is “the most recent reminder of how our social media space is operating as a check and balance on our journalism.”

Perhaps the most blatant indictment in the court of public opinion has arrived via Twitter, where #BrianWilliamsMisremembers is still a national trending topic, a day after the story came to light. His mistake has become a meme — a parade of photos and fictional anecdotes “misremember” him at various watershed moments in history.

Social media may amplify the message of Williams’ “misremembering,” but in a business where credibility is the only currency, Williams’ fate is sealed, says Carl Hausman.

“I would think that his removal is inevitable,” said Hausman, professor of journalism at Rowan University. “This is something that directly relates to his work and his reporting.” Hausman said. “It just looks to me that the apology was a little disingenuous, too.”

Scott Sobel, a former broadcast journalist for NBC affiliates, said Williams had taken a step in the right direction with his on-air apology, but thinks his stated explanation about misremembering and conflating is another blunder.

“That sounds very, very evasive as to what happened,” said Sobel, now president of Media & Communications Strategies, a crisis management firm in Washington, D.C.