So if this report is correct then the problem is not that "Williams lied", it's about the embarrassment at NBC when the story got out into the open? Yeah, sounds like a liberal attitude.
If indeed Brokaw knew, why isn’t he being lampooned and his integrity questioned?
When Brokaw retired, NBC was #1 in the evening news ratings, and Williams has been able to maintain that position, though ABC did occasionally eclipse him. The difference between first and third place in the network news wars is measured in millions of dollars a year, even in an era when most Americans get their news on-line and the combined audiences for the evening newscasts of ABC, NBC and CBS is a fraction of what it once was.
Having Williams in the top spot was also a boon to local NBC affiliates, providing a better lead-in for their newscasts, and contributing more to their bottom line.
So, having a congenital liar in the anchor chair was good business for NBC, and they will probably retain Williams, as long as the ratings don't slip. The greatest sin in broadcasting isn't telling a lie (and repeating it over and over again); it's failing to attract enough eyeballs.
If anyone bothered to look in the closets of the various network anchors, they'd find enough skeletons to fill a cemetary—and. The late Peter Jennings was a serial philanderer who was married four times. In one of the great ironies of the gossip business, a number of columnists expressed sympathy for him when wife #3 (Kati Marton) began having an affair that broke up their marriage.
Dan Rather reportedly had a girlfriend for years, and so did Ted Koppel. Both were pikers compared to Matt Lauer whose unfaithfulness destroyed his first marriage and his second wife file divorce papers against him back in 2006 (accusing him of metal cruelty, among other things) before reuniting. And more recently, we've been privy to some of the texts sent from 60 Minutes correspondent Steve Kroft to his much-young mistress.
Of this sleazy group, the only one fired (to date) is Dan Rather and obviously, his dismissal from CBS had nothing to do with any extra-curricular activities. In fact, his role in the fictional 60 Minutes report on George W. Bush's ANG service was just a convenient excuse. His real crime, as far as CBS was concerned, was anchoring a newscast that had been in last place for more than a decade before the "fake, but accurate" debacle. Network anchors get a lot of passes from their friends in the media, and they take full advantage of that latitude. Almost impossible to find a decent, honorable human being in the bunch.