Jon Stewart Tops News Anchors
By Meg Thomson, Staff Writer //
NBC News anchor Brian Williams has been in the spotlight quite a lot these past few months after being suspended from the NBC network for six months without pay. The events came to light when Williams admitted to the exaggeration and embellishment of his Iraqi helicopter adventure in 2003. Originally, Williams had claimed to have been in a helicopter that was shot down in a chase. However, certain facts came to light, and he later acknowledged that he was not in the aircraft that was shot down, but rather in an aircraft following behind.
“I feel terrible about making this mistake,” Williams said via Facebook. “Especially since I found my OWN WRITING about the incident from back in ‘08, and I was indeed on the Chinook behind the bird that took the RPG in the tail housing just above the ramp. Because I have no desire to fictionalize my experience and no need to dramatize events as they actually happened, I think the constant viewing of the video showing us inspecting the impact area — and the fog of memory over 12 years — made me conflate the two, and I apologize.”
When it comes to credibility, his has been tarnished.
Meanwhile, someone else has risen to a different sort of journalistic fame: Jon Stewart. I know, he is not truly a “news anchor” – I am 100 percent aware of that. However, I find that his news broadcasts and interpretations of the news are inherently neutral and brutally honest. While he does not always directly report the news, he analyzes the news reporting of others and finds bias and holes in their stories.
Stewart is a tell-it-like-it-is kind of man; while his show is meant to be a comedy (an obvious fact; it airs on Comedy Central), there is an underlying truth to his narration and commentary. He does not put up with any of the nonsense put forth by reporters like Brian Williams. He is not afraid to stand up to the authority figures of news stations and tell them that they are reporting false information or biased opinions. While Stewart’s reporting does have some opinion within it, they are not usually political biases. “Liberal and conservative have lost their meaning in America,” says Stewart. “I represent the distracted center.” I like to think of Stewart as the man who says what the rest of the world is thinking.
When it comes to credibility, I would say that Stewart has the majority of my trust. Brian Williams has proven his word to be unreliable through his lies and exaggerations expressed to once trusting audiences.