Media on Brian Williams

There is an important principle here in the sarcasm...that is, the one who scored the winning touchdown doesn't remember it as if he was the one sitting on the bench.  The commonality in the liar is grandiose thinking, which comes out in speech.  Each of Williams' lies were to his own benefit.  He did not lie about an actual accomplishment of his, 'mis-remembering' himself 'outside' of the event.

Senility:  When a person with dementia, or a similar disorder, or even an elderly person who's memory is impacted gives a false statement, the language will not show deception unless the person knows he is being deceitful.

Deceit in language is seen in intent.  It is when one wishes to deceive, either through the deliberate suppression of information, or in the actual fabrication of information, there are often signals in the language.

Lie Detection is no "magic bullet", as portrayed on television, or by those who claim to simply look at someone's face expression and "know."

The detecting of deception is not only principled work, but it takes diligent practice, and constant repetition as the brain learns to "listen" to the speech of others, after a lifetime of 'dulled listening' or "interpretive" listening.

The subject matter (content) is not a technique in lie detection as sometimes the seemingly impossible takes place.  Where Brian Williams said he reached in and felt a cuddly unknown, which turned out to be "two eyes" of a "three week old puppy", I do not believe to be true.  His firehouse may have had three doors, three engines and thirty men, but the three week old puppy story is something I choose not to believe, but it is based upon experience, and not Statement Analysis. The statement is too short, but I also believe that asking Williams about it, focusing in questions to the areas of either question, or sensitivity, will reveal deception. He is the "less than 10%" type of liar.  This does not mean that he will always deceive in this manner.  In fact, we should expect to hear of many more "heroic" fabrications from him, and in his language, we should expect that the high majority of his method of deception will be editing out information and not direct lies.

I write often of the 90% effect, and this is the rare exception where, perhaps, only one in ten deceptive individuals will go as far as Williams.  We saw the same thing, in topic, with the politician, Richard Blumenthal, who claimed to have actually been in Viet Nam, or in Hillary Clinton's statements of "claim", that is, having done something, or been somewhere, falsely.  This is not suppressed information, though I expect to find much in this manner, but outright falsehood.

It is a very strong signal that the subject is a habitual or "pathological" liar, who will always trump himself or herself up, even when not challenged.  Personality wise, they appear to be "unable to turn it off."

These types can be conservative, liberal, or independent, but are almost always narcissistic, self-interested, and can be ruthless, without true empathy towards what impact others face from their lies.

When one is incorrect, he is not deceptive and his language will not show it.  It is that in 90% + of deceivers, the language will reveal it.  "Playing the odds" is always helpful, but never without an open mind to consider, "Is this person lying to me?"

A smirk of the face may convince one that he is being lied to, only to learn that the liar has a sinus condition.

Statement Analysis is a science that is applied, evenly across the board, yielding a very high percentage of accuracy.

Please remember always;  Where there is "70% likely", the other "30%" exists, just as here, in Williams' case, the "less than 10%" does, from time to time, come up.  When it does, know the manner of person you are looking at.

This person, statistically, will bring harm, sometimes irreparable harm, to any and everyone, in his path, and although may appear to be remorseful, the actual words his brain chooses in his "mea culpa", will be consistent with his lies:

To protect himself.

This is why famous people do better in their apology making, when they have someone else prepare the statement for them.  Fortunately for truth seekers, the narcissist sometimes will "over rule" the counsel of others, and insist on certain wording and...

it gives them away.

Interesting article from the NY Post.  Media is competition.  The competition smells weakness of its prey.

We shouldn’t believe Williams’ lie was an innocent mistake

nYpost.com 

Modal Trigger

Brian Williams did it all for the soldiers, you see. His chopper whoppers were patriotic acts. “This was a bungled attempt by me to thank one special veteran,” he explained.

In a similar vein, ­Anthony Weiner’s sext­ing was really just a misunderstood celebration of the technological sophistication of smartphones, and Bill Clinton’s dalliance with Monica Lewinsky was a selfless way to promote that great American company the Gap.

What Williams’ lie was about was what lies are always about: No one who actually scored the winning touchdown on the high-school football team misremembers it as sitting on the bench. The term “fish tale” does not mean you mistakenly tell people you caught a sickly ­8-ounce catfish when actually you snagged a 95-pound monster marlin.

Williams or­iginally told the truth about what happened in 2003 Iraq: He was on a Chinook helicopter. Another helicopter was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG). His helo was nowhere near the one that was struck and landed some 30 or more minutes later. That isn’t a near-miss; that’s just rubbernecking at something you didn’t even know happened until you came along later.

Joseph Miller, who says he was the flight engineer on Williams’ helo, said Williams was excited from the beginning, immediately spinning a what-if story: “He had the audacity to tell me the whole thing was like ‘Saving Private Ryan’ and that the whole Army would be out looking for him,” Miller said, adding, “I called him an idiot in front of his camera crew.”

Hey, NBC, do your job for a change: Let’s see that footage. It’ll be the newsiest stuff you run all week.

In 2013, Williams marveled at his own bravery, telling Alec Baldwin on WNYC radio that he thought he was going to die when the imaginary grenade hit his helo. “I guess I do say to myself and to others — ‘I’ve got this’ — and I don’t know where that unbrid­led confidence comes from.”

Gee, that doesn’t really sound like the “Saving Private Ryan” freakout Miller described.

Part of Williams’ self-delusion is that he’s some sort of ordinary Joe in touch with the real America. He nudges profiles to describe him as a “blue-collar Jersey guy.” His dad was an executive, not a coal miner. He fancies himself as in tune with the working men as he collects $10 million a year for successfully looking “troubled” or “sincere” or “amused” while reading 20 minutes of script off a prompter.

NBC, which had several other employees on the Chinook who apparently narked on Williams because nobody can stand this classic self-promoting ass (“He’s a real pompous piece of s–t,” a longtime colleague told Page Six), warned him from the beginning not to embellish the truth, and a source told Variety with pride that Williams’ tall tale was never featured on an NBC News program.

So he peddled his yarn elsewhere, gradually making himself sound more devil-may-care, to the point where, in a 2013 appearance on “Late Show” that Williams apparently timed for the 10th anniversary of his Iraq stint so he’d have an excuse to talk about it, he didn’t contradict David Letterman’s description of him as a “war hero.”

We should have known he was lying then; actual heroes hate being called heroes.

By his own account, Williams is a little confused in the head. He said, “I don’t know what screwed up in my mind that caused me to conflate one aircraft with another,” and “I spent most of the weekend thinking I’d gone crazy,” and “I would not have chosen to make this mistake,” implying that some entity other than he was responsible. Was it mind control? Schizophrenia? Someone get Brian a tinfoil hat to block those gamma rays!

If Williams remains on NBC, it will be impossible for him to report on the military. Every time NBC News calls him (as its president did in December) “one of the most trusted journalists of our time,” Twitter and Facebook will detonate with reminders to the contrary. Williams sits on the board of the Congressional Medal of Honor Foundation. Probably he’ll be forced to resign from that.

Does NBC News need that embarrassment?

In the military, bragging about the courageous stuff you didn’t do is known as theft of valor. “Nobody is trying to steal anyone’s valor,” Williams insisted. Oh. OK, then. Tell that to all the military heroes whose stories haven’t been told.