The alarm went off about five words into the NBC broadcast, when Williams noted to the audience that it was a fire alarm going off, before finishing up the story and tossing to reporter Tom Costello. The alarm continued through the report, and Williams clarified that “there is no danger to us,” that the alarm was merely an inconveniently scheduled “announcement.”

The moment via NBC below:

On the heels of ABC’s huge audience–nearly 15 million viewers–for Diane Sawyer‘s exclusive interview with kidnap victim Jaycee Dugard comes word the interview, which was previewed on Sawyer’s ABC World News, boosted ABC’s evening newscast into a first place finish ahead of NBC Nightly News. On Thursday night, World News beat Nightly by 106,000 total viewers (7.656 million vs. 7.550 million), and helped drive World News to its best weekly performance in six weeks.

Compared to a year ago, World News has grown its total viewing audience for twenty consecutive weeks, leading many ABC News insiders to believe their goal of passing long-dominant Nightly News is not far off. Last week’s ratings put the gap between the two evening newscasts at its smallest point in nearly a year.

CBS, meanwhile, with new anchor Scott Pelley, remains well behind in third place, with an average total audience of 5.625 million viewers.

Williams might as well have said that Netanyahu “will not, as President Obama has called for, start a professional Kitten Skeet Shooting League,” for all the relationship his statement had with reality. President Obama did not call for a return to the ’67 borders, and if Williams didn’t know it, either of the two NBC reporters who attended Jay Carney‘s briefing on the topic, minutes after the Obama/Netanyahu meeting, should have clued him in. Here’s what Carney told reporters that day:

Q    But on the issue of borders, I know the President didn’t specifically bring this up in the pool spray, but Prime Minister Netanyahu did.  He said that going back to the ’67 borders is indefensible.  How does that square off with what the President said yesterday?

MR. CARNEY:  Well, I think what the President said yesterday was quite clear.  The President said the borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines, with mutually agreed swaps, so that secure and recognized borders are established for both states.  That is a formulation that has been understood by parties to these negotiations and by anybody who’s been a close observer of these negotiations in this region for years.  He felt it was important to articulate that.

The security issue here is recognized by the President, was recognized clearly by the President in his speech yesterday and again today in the Oval Office.  He made clear that every state has a right to self-defense, that Israel must be able to defend itself by itself against any threat.  He made clear that security provisions must also be robust enough to prevent a resurgence of terrorism, to stop the infiltration of weapons, and to provide effective border security.

And I think that, again, anybody who knows this issue knows that this has been an understood starting point for resolving one of the four major issues between these two peoples, which is territory, for a long time.

Q    But I guess the question is then what is happening today on the U.S. side –

MR. CARNEY:  Do you mean, did they resolve the Arab-Israeli — I mean, the Palestinian-Israel negotiations today?  No.

Q    Is there progress being made to get the Israeli side to move closer to the U.S. position on the border issue?

MR. CARNEY:  I think, again, there is nothing that the President said yesterday that contradicts the 2004 letters that were exchanged between President Bush and Prime Minister Sharon, or what Prime Minister Netanyahu said today in the Oval Office.  We — the President said in his speech that a starting point for resolving the territorial issue is the 1967 lines, with mutually agreed swaps and security for both nations.  I think that’s — there’s nothing in that statement and the President’s speech yesterday that is contradicted by what the Prime Minister said.

Q    So why is he so mad?

MR. CARNEY:  I’m not sure that I accept that he was mad.  I think they had an excellent meeting.

Q    He said it’s indefensible.

MR. CARNEY:  No, no, he said the borders — first of all, it’s important to understand — I mean, I shouldn’t have to parse words from the President or the Prime Minister.  He said the borders were indefensible.  That’s an issue about security –

There are legitimate grounds for criticism here, although O’Donnell’s explication of the necessity of Netanyahu’s posture renders much of it moot, but there is no wiggle room on the fact that President Obama did not do what Williams said he did. Compounding the error is the fact that, despite heated ratings competition among cable news channels, they represent only a fraction of the broadcast networks’ audience size. When they get it wrong, tens of millions of Americans get it wrong.

Much of the speculation has focused on Scott Pelley, the CBS lifer who’s a correspondent at 60 Minutes. Pelley’s a nice guy, a good reporter and would surely do a fine job as an evening news anchor.

But the question for CBS now shouldn’t really be “who gets Katie’s job,” but rather, “why should anybody get that job?” The concept of the network evening newscast is dated at best—a throwback to time last century when there were only three television networks and the anchors were titanic figures.

Times have changed. The audience for the evening news has aged—as evidenced by NBC’s plans this week to pitch the NBC Nightly News to advertisers as a kind of bargain, admitting that yes, 2/3 of the ads on Nightly are medicines or “personal care” products that appeal to an older demographic, but the network says those viewers tend to watch TV live, and they stick around through the commercials. Great for advertisers!

In other words, network evening news viewers don’t watch television the way people do today. We DVR, we download, we stream, we time shift, and many of us only see commercials when we watch programming on Hulu or at the top of a DVD that won’t let us skip ahead to the menu.

So in that landscape, why stick with the CBS Evening News? The only reasons I can think of are these: first, it’s a tradition. It connects us to the days of Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite, and for that reason, it’s hard to argue killing it. But that’s merely an emotional reaction, not a business one.

The second reason to keep a third network newscast is an even bigger concern: if CBS folds the tent on the Evening News, that’s surrendering some ever more rare news real estate on a network—without a cable channel—that just doesn’t have much news product to cut.

You can imagine a post-Couric and post-Evening News world where the local news on CBS stations would be followed not by a third-rated network newscast, but a somewhat better rated game show or yet another entertainment magazine. So we give up Bob Schieffer and Lara Logan and get Snooki and Lindsay Lohan.

That sounds like a seriously bad deal–even if the economics make sense.

And yet, it’s really hard to argue for the CBS Evening News. If Scott Pelley takes the job, the newscast will likely continue to struggle in the ratings—hobbled, as Couric herself argues this week to The New York Times, by poor lead-ins from local CBS stations that also have ratings issues.

So what’s the answer?

I’d urge CBS to kill the CBS Evening News, but hold on to that news real estate. Instead of putting another anchor into a newscast that doesn’t compete but keeps doing the same thing, why not experiment? Offer an alternative to ABC’s World News and NBC Nightly News—and to the high volume politics and opinion on cable news at that hour.

What if CBS took a page from its own amazing history and transformed the 6:30 half hour into a modern See It Now, with a truly gifted journalist taking thirty minutes five nights a week to delve deeply—and aggressively—into the most controversial and important topics we face as a country? A real reporter given a platform not to become yet another TV blowhard, but rather, to be willing to chose serious and important over sensational and meaningless.

The original See It Now, hosted by Murrow, took viewers to talk to soldiers in Korea at Christmas, and fearlessly took on the Red Scare in the form of Joe McCarthy. It was never a ratings powerhouse, but it racked up journalism’s highest honors and it created the legend that was CBS News. 60 Minutes (Pelley’s home) grew out of See It Now, and surely there are people at CBS today who could create a show worthy to bear the See It Now name.

With the lowest of expectations, CBS would have little immediate pressure to deliver ratings, but could do something entirely unexpected: create something new (and old) and something important. Something, arguably, that younger viewers and non-evening-news watching viewers might set their DVRs for, to watch later in the evening. (Yes, call me nuts, but I still believe there’s an appetite out there–maybe not a huge one, but at least as big as that of the current CBS Evening News–for serious reporting on important stuff)

Who could take the Murrow role? Who has the courage, the smarts, the reporting chops and the passion to make See It Now must-see-TV in 2011?

Well, I’d argue that’s a much better question for CBS than who should replace Katie Couric as anchor of the CBS Evening News.

The new effort by NBC involves comparing Nightly News to popular primetime shows like CSI and The Closer:

Would any advertiser really want to trade in the scores of viewers between 18 and 34 who tend to watch prime time for the pill-popping crowd marketers tend to believe tune in to the daily evening newscast? Since 30-second spots in the three broadcast network evening news shows run anywhere from $23,000 and $45,000, according to media buyers, that’s less than a quarter of the about $200,000 it costs to run an ad on Fox’s “House” and substantially less than the about $135,000 price tag to run an ad in NBC’s own “30 Rock.” Indeed, some news veterans think the NBC effort makes sense in an industry where technology is scrambling many preconceived notions.

“Sales rubrics that continue to dwell on the simple number of people a particular form of media delivers will be ill-served. With the scattering of audiences to many distribution platforms, the key to successful advertising in the future is demographic,” said Paul Conti, an assistant professor of communication at the College of Saint Rose in Albany, N.Y., and a former longtime news director at NBC affiliate WNYT. “Mass delivery of an advertising message will be effective in mega events like the Super Bowl or the Olympics. With ordinary TV shows or news programs, the more important concept will be the receptivity of the viewers to the message.”

And those loyal, attentive Nightly News viewers will be very receptive to your message, at a much lower cost compared to primetime, NBC argues.

For the first quarter of 2011, in the key demo of adults 25-54, the CBS Evening News averaged 1.98 million viewers, compared to ABC World News‘ 2.43 million and NBC Nightly News‘ 2.94 million.

At NBC, the first quarter numbers mean another first-place finish, though the ratings dropped from a year ago, when NBC had high ratings as the network carried the Olympics. ABC, meanwhile, with a continued aggressive push including high profile interviews and travel by anchor Diane Sawyer, was the only network evening newscast to gain viewers year-to-year, and posted its largest first quarter audience since 2008. The network also saw double-digit ratings increases versus the fourth quarter 2010.

As Engel reports, the Libyan rebels are poorly armed and lack leadership–weaknesses made vividly clear in his report. The rebel Engel was interviewing at the time the artillery rounds hit their location was armed only with a plastic gun–which he risked his life to retrieve amid the shelling.

It’s a story well worth watching. See it here, from NBC News:

NBC execs point out that the ratings for Nightly were bigger than the viewership of some primetime shows, including ABC’s Grey’s Anatomy (11.182 million viewers) and The Bachelor (9.660 million).

Williams anchored the broadcast from Cairo on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and from Amman, Jordan on Thursday.

ABC’s Diane Sawyer, meanwhile, was not in the region, but her ABC World News also hit a longtime ratings high. World News was second among the network evening newscasts with 9.82 million viewers, its largest audience in nearly four years.

Sawyer anchored in New York, with Christiane Amanpour and David Muir leading ABC’s forces in Egypt.

ABC’s decision led The New York Times‘ Alessandra Stanley to question the value of having main anchors on the scene, compared to experienced international correspondents like Amanpour:

The ABC anchor Diane Sawyer stayed in New York and let Ms. Amanpour do what she does best. The NBC anchor Brian Williams had rushed to Cairo, followed by Katie Couric of CBS. They worked hard, but in that volatile setting, the network anchors didn’t have much to do; the best reporting was provided by well-connected veterans like Richard Engel on NBC and Lara Logan of CBS. After pro-Mubarak mobs began going after journalists — Ms. Couric was jostled while trying to report live on Wednesday from Tahrir Square — she and Mr. Williams left the country, quite wisely. On Friday Ms. Couric and Mr. Williams were both back in New York.

At CBS, Katie Couric also traveled to Cairo, and her CBS Evening News placed third overall with 7.35 million viewers, but that also represented a jump for Evening News, with its largest audience since the week ending January 30, 2009 (when the broadcast delivered 7.74 million viewers).

The woman who escorted nine-year old victim Christina Taylor Green to see Rep. Gabrielle Giffords has sat down with NBC’s Brian Williams to tell the horrific story of the shootings and the death of Christina.

Speaking to Williams in Tucson, Suzi Hileman shares her memory of looking down at the wounded girl, trying to keep her alive until help could get there. “And I’m yelling at her, ‘Christina Taylor Green, don’t you die on me.’”

Hileman says the shooting was so fast that the injured, including Christina, were left wondering what had happened:

And she’s looking at me, and it was, she was wondering, she was confused, she was asking me, “What is going on?” And I’m just telling her to “Stay with me, do not leave me here by myself, young lady.”

Portions of the emotional interview are set to air tonight on NBC Nightly News.

Watch the clip here, from NBC News:

According to NBC, Nightly has beaten ABC by over 1.4 million viewers for three consecutive weeks, and has been the top rated evening newscast for 62 weeks in a row.

Over at ABC, execs point out that World News was the only evening newscast to grow total viewers and viewers 25-54. Also, Diane Sawyer and crew reported from China–and while overseas trips often result in ratings dips, World News had its best showing since March.

“A growing number of viewers tell me they time-shift the news,” Mr. Williams wrote. “Loyal viewers used to say ‘we watch you every night.’ These days, an increasing number make a point of saying ‘We RECORD you every night.’ ”

Williams concedes he does a lot of time-shifting at home, catching his favorites (Friday Night Lights, The Office, 30 Rock and–yes kids, he has access to non-NBC content–ABC’s Modern Family) via DVR.

When asked by a scarf-clad Mitchell about how he felt about the recent Koran burning and “Ground Zero mosque” controversies, Ahmadinejad said, “There is no conflict between the two countries. We should find where the problem is.”

He continued:

I ask this question: “Do the people of the United States hate the muslims?” Is that so? That’s not true. Muslims do not hate Americans either. … We believe that there is a minority in the United States and they are zionists. They have no religion. They believe in no religion.”

When Mitchell pressed the Iranian leader to explain away the Jewish and Christian leaders who supported the controversial mosque project, as well as critical comments by his “old friend” Fidel Castro, Ahmadinejad seemed put off by her interruptions, tersely saying “you should let me explain.” After some awkwardly (and unconvincingly) polite quarreling, he responded:

What you seen in Islam — Islamic countries — is what the people are against, that ugly behavior. They are not against the people of the United States. They are not against Americans. They are not against Jews. They are not against Christians or Christrianity. They are not against any church.

When speaking of how President Obama has affected tensions between the United States and Iran, he claimed that there are “certain groups” preventing the commander-in-chief from mending relations. He asked Mitchell, “Do you really think President Obama can do anything he wishes to?”

From the very first question, Letterman (armed with his Jay Leno impression) joked at his rival’s expense while Williams played the role of mediator.

“You probably go on the Jay Leno show, don’t you?” asked Letterman to start the interview. “I do,” said Williams. “We have a robust slate of evening programming.”

“But I don’t like it when you go on that show,” said Letterman, leading to a discussion as to why New York is better than L.A., Leno’s garage and how Williams has transitioned into Tom Brokaw‘s role so well.

But the main point from Letterman revolved around this: “I like to think of you and me as more real guys, as opposed to you and Jay.”

Williams does a good job of deflecting the harshest critiques of Leno from Letterman and playing along when he could. From his SNL guest hosting stint to his “Slow-Jamming The News” with The Roots on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Williams shines in late night appearances. Even when the topic is awkward.

Here’s the beginning of the interview (via Gawker TV):

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As Steve Krakauer reported earlier today, it’s somewhat noteworthy when a cable news host takes to Twitter, mid-taping, to review his fellow competitors. But that is the social media age we live in now. As Krakauer wrote:

It’s not surprising Olbermann was tuned into the competition. All cable news hosts surely knew what the others are leading with, since TVs are in each studio. But a live editorial dispute between competitors during their respective shows? That was rare – and only really possible in the Twitter Age of media.

Sanchez actually led his show by saying, “As we begin this newscast, I want to get you to California. We’ve got some video coming in now that details what some of the reaction is out there and there has been a bevy of it.” He played some video, but the first segment was about the shooting. Over the next half hour he mentioned the Prop 8 ruling several times (including using the Twitterboard), but didn’t have a segment about the decision until 8:38pmET.

As you can see in the following clip, Nightly News opened their show last night with the same editorial decision, covering the shooting tragedy in Connecticut for roughly three minutes, before getting to the Proposition 8 story. If it bleeds, it leads.

At the beginning of the program, Katie Couric introduced the first report from Mark Strassmann in the Gulf. Then things got weird.

Just as Couric introduces him, you can hear, faintly, a voice say “Martin, good evening.” That was NBC’s Lester Holt, in for Brian Williams, of NBC, introducing Martin Fletcher.

Then, as Strassmann started talking, visually, the audio was of Fletcher talking. “Lester, good evening…” he started. This went on for approximately seven confusing seconds before CBS began airing the pre-taped report.

Here’s the CBS clip:

And here was NBC’s broadcast:

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Who: Brian Williams, interviewed by Jeff Greenfield
What: “In the News with Jeff Greenfield – Brian Williams”
Where: 92^nd St. Y
When: April 18, 2010
Thumbs: Up

Brian Williams said proudly that he grew up watching Johnny Carson and Walter Cronkite. This comes as no surprise to his fans who recognize that on a regular basis Williams finds the perfect blend between comedy and self-deprecation and earnestness and seriousness.

While Williams acknowledged that the days when families gathered around the TV for the 6:30 news – as his did – are long gone, he reminded the audience that nightly newscasts still do very well ratings-wise. He pointed out that NBC’s ratings in February, for example, were three to four times better than Bill O’Reilly’s were. And, he added, broadcasts are still the main source of news for Americans, ahead of websites and newspapers.

What does Williams read on the internet? “Mostly aggregators,” he said. Drudge and HuffPo are in the mix with Time, Newsweek, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, New York Post, and USA Today. There are no bloggers that Williams would cite by name as being on the A-list, but he did credit Gawker for its breaking coverage of the Fort Hood massacre last year. That evening, he said, Gawker was beating the networks to information by an hour or two. Williams admitted that around the time of major events or decisions – Supreme Court, elections, natural disasters – he checks blogs to see what they’re reporting.

But those sites are limited. Nightly news excels in its world news coverage. On-the-ground reporting is especially close to Williams’ heart, and he credits NBC for allowing him to do so much of it despite the stark reality of its expense. That’s something new media doesn’t yet do well. It’s a good thing we have anchors like Williams providing images and reports we can conjure up when framing and reconsidering our impressions.

What They Said
“When you get to the afternoon, Fox goes from the attractive Munster daughter to the monster under the stairs.”
- Brian Williams looks at how the news competition shapes up

“I think people confused the coverage on behalf of the electorate with coverage of the man.”
- Brian Williams responds to criticism that the media is in bed with Obama with a simple answer: his story had actual significance.

“When complaints are down the middle, I’m happy. All is right in the world.”
- Brian Williams says that he judges his bias – and fairness – in reporting based on the feedback he receives

“If you’re covering a rally and one of them is doing something to a plastic doll…I’m just saying.”
- Brian Williams tries to explain why the Tea Party has been depicted the way it has in the media

What We Thought

• Jeff Greenfield set a very high bar for other interviewers. Not only were his questions well-considered and -prepared, he added his own thoughts and impressions to the back end of Williams’ comments. As a veteran media professional himself – and equally worthy of being in the interview seat, no doubt – Greenfield brought insights and stories that further enhanced the discussion.
• We agree with Williams and Greenfield that newspapers continue to offer something that websites cannot: the stumble. Some subjects like architecture aren’t as prone to make you click a headline. But if reading a newspaper, Williams said, you might find yourself intrigued by the story as you scan your eyes over it. We know that we’ve discovered interest in topics we didn’t plan to read about as a result of the newspaper stumble.

PANEL RULES!

Some audience behavior seems to repeat itself panel after panel. We’ll be updating a running list of “PANEL RULES!” that will help ensure that you are not the dweeb of the Panel Nerds.

Panel Nerds don’t like…Tiger spotters
While most of the questions were excellent, one stood out for us as a tad low-brow. Someone wanted to know why the media had run “hog wild” with Tiger Woods’ coverage and when it would cease. Williams protested that his network had covered it only “sparingly” because he doesn’t really see the news value in the story. The merits of the need to cover the story can be debated. But not in April. We’ve already seen the Masters go by and a definite dissipation in the interest and coverage of the story. This question would have had some teeth if it was posed back in December or January. In April, it’s just an old story, even for those who secretly want to know what will happen next for Tiger.

Stewart and Williams had an entertaining conversation – again, the two have good chemistry. Of course, one of the main areas of questioning involved Williams’ recent trip to Haiti, before the two mostly goofed off for the last two minutes. Which is fine – it’s a comedy show, after all, which Stewart has never been shy about. That’s what made it all the more jarring, when about 1:50 in, he said this:

Here’s what I’m curious about, honestly, as a journalist. You’re a journalist, I’m not a journalist. You’re a journalist.

If he really called himself a journalist, even briefly, it shows that even for the fake reporter, fake reporting can feel like the real thing. Watch below and decide what you think Stewart meant.

We talked to Williams this week about the experience and the story, still dominating the evening news on a regular basis, in the latest Q&A in our “Back From Haiti” series.

Mediaite: Now that you’ve returned, and can reflect a little on the story, what do you take away most from the story in Haiti?

Williams: It’s hard to express it. I’ve tried with my own family. It’s also hard to discuss the media role there and any struggles we had. I came home from there to structure, a loving family, a good life in America and things like food and possessions. I know members of the media who have a kind of survivors guilt after being exposed to what we were exposed to. It’s the depths and depravity and sadness and it’s hard to say that I’m happy for anything to come out of this. But I am happy for one thing. I think the Haitian people were properly portrayed in the news media of having a near endless capacity for suffering and hardship, and profound dignity and such an admirable work ethic. This was my fourth trip to Haiti. I plan to go back. We’re doing as much coverage as we did a week ago, or ten days ago.

“This is just so gripping and so sad.”

Mediaite: When do you plan on returning?

Williams: I feel it would be appropriate to go back only with a real reason for it. To just generically go back and walk through it would be a little pointless since we have perfectly able and capable people on the story. There will be benchmarks. Both former Presidents will probably go to follow up on the American generosity. Think it will become apparent when to go.

Mediaite: You were the first of the big three anchors to start reporting from Haiti. Can you describe the immediate steps you took to get to the story?

Williams: First of all we had an employee of NBC with a loved one who worked at the embassy and couldn’t reach him. It was a very tentative first afternoon. The earthquake first came in at a 6.8, and then rose to 7.0, and because of what it did to the communications network it was unclear that night how bad it was…Where plane landed, we unloaded, put our gear down and just set up because we thought the premium was to get on TV and after dark we’d worry about where we’d get what passed for sleep that first night. Everything just moved very quickly. You can’t do this in a vacuum, you need to bring water, generators, MREs to feed the team. You’re caring for a big traveling family and thank goodness we’ve done this before, in terrible places, many times. We’re used to the drill – but you never get used to what you see.

>>>NEXT PAGE: How Williams deals with reporting from war zones and tragedies.

But last night he let down his guard and revealed his bias – about baseball player (and now admitted steroid user) Mark McGwire.

Williams kicked off the evening newscast with the news McGwire had finally admitted to using steroids at several times during his career, including during his 1998 record-breaking season. Yes, it was the lead story at NBC. Meanwhile Diane Sawyer anchored ABC World News from Afghanistan and focused on that story in the lead segment, and Katie Couric and CBS Evening News led with the network’s latest poll about Pres. Obama’s first year in office and congressional junkets.

Anyway, back to baseball. Here’s how Williams started the broadcast:

Because this is a family broadcast, we probably can’t say what we’d like to about the news today that Mark McGwire, the home run hitter, the fan favorite from the St. Louis Cardinals, stopped lying today and admitted that he did it while on steroids. For those of us who were raising young baseball fans and baseball players who looked up to Mark McGwire, that summer of ‘98 was magical stuff, as he and Sammy Sosa vied back and forth for the title of Single Season Home Run King. He didn’t tell the truth to Congress or to his fans until finally, formally coming clean today

What would have have said if the Nightly News wasn’t a “family broadcast”? And why exactly is Williams using this opportunity to go all Keith Olbermann-talking-about-George W. Bush over one of the hundreds of baseball players who took performance enhancing drugs?

Salon’s Glenn Greenwald took on Williams on Twitter:

Walter Cronkite stood up to the U.S. Government over the lies in Vietnam – Brian Williams stands up to a baseball player…
Hopefully, tomorrow Brian Williams will lead his broadcast with a probing, fearless, outraged investigation of cheating in spelling bees.

Or how about just giving 22 minutes of hard news every night?

Here’s the opening segment of the Nightly News about McGwire (h/t Gawker TV):

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

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The honor goes to Andrea Mitchell of NBC, according to the invaluable resource that is Andrew Tyndall‘s TyndallReport.com. Here’s a full breakdown.

Michell currently serves as Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent for NBC, as well as anchor of the 1pmET Andrea Mitchell Reports on MSNBC. Tyndall reports she had 2,416 minutes of air time on the NBC Nightly News – an astonishing figure. Right behind are her colleagues Robert Bazell, with 2,328 and Pete Williams, with 2,280.

Here are the top 10:

NBC Andrea Mitchell Diplomatic 2416
NBC Robert Bazell Medicine 2328
NBC Pete Williams Justice 2280
CBS David Martin Pentagon 2096
NBC David Gregory White House 2082
NBC Lisa Myers Capitol/Investigative 2069
CBS Jim Axelrod White House 1960
NBC Jim Miklaszewski Pentagon 1829
NBC Anne Thompson Domestic/Environment 1758
CBS Anthony Mason Economy 1697

One thing this shows is NBC and CBS have kept their reporters on the beat for longer than ABC News and ABC World News, which has seen far more turnover (with Dan Harris coming in at #11).

When looking at the top stories of the decade on the evening newscasts, ABC comes up again. The #1 story by far covered by each network was the war in Iraq (invasion, combat all added together). CBS spent 2,329 minutes on the story, followed by NBC with 2,149 and ABC with 1,967. It’s hard to find which stories ABC made up the slightly less time it had covering the Iraq War story. They spent more time on Pres. Obama’s 2008 campaign, Tornadoes and TARP, but only very marginally.

Either way, it’s fun to look at – check out TyndallReport.com for more.

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The wheelchair-bound, 108-year-old Buckles came to Capitol Hill last Thursday to support Senate legislation that would designate a WWI memorial on the National Mall — apparently there is an old one that would be re-dedicated with federal funds, and officially designated the national monument. There is currently some controversy about this because of a push to get the “official” designation for the Liberty Memorial in Kansas City, Missouri. Also completely worthy — it has the National World War 1 museum — but why shouldn’t the nation’s capital have one too? Can’t America honor the young, brave soldiers who fought a century ago for what this country has today in more than one place? 100,000 Americans died in WWI. I think two cities can memorialize that. Don’t make an old man come to Washington to remind you of what he did!

From CNN:

Last year, Buckles visited the District of Columbia’s World War I Memorial. In his wheelchair and bundled against the cold, he slowly toured the overgrown site and noted the names engraved along the gazebo’s marble walls are only of those who hailed from the District of Columbia.

He also saw the rundown condition of the 1930s monument and became determined to symbolically lead a drive to restore the structure and support making it a national memorial.

“The memorial [on the Mall], it’s an excellent idea!” he told lawmakers.

When he visited the District of Columbia memorial a year ago, Buckles said he did not expect to become the last man standing, the one left to represent Americans those who fought in World War I.

“I have to,” he told CNN, “because I’m the last living member of Americans” who fought in what at the time was called The Great War.

The bill, sponsored by Sen. John Thune, clashes with Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill. I’m usually a big fan of McCaskill (love her on Tumblr!) but, her state’s interests aside, it is really hard to argue with an 108-year-old man who fought in World War 1. How can that not be the deciding vote? Anyway, learn about him below. What an incredible thing to do at his age. He should be honored now, as well as for all he did then.

Last surviving World War I soldier, 108, storms US Congress [AFP]
Frank Buckles [Wikipedia]

Tonight Williams thanked his viewers for sticking with him through all that (and through the Charlie Gibson challenge, which was close at times!), and looked back on those five years and what they meant. He also said he looked forward to many more such anniversaries, though going forward he’ll be facing challenges by Diane Sawyer along with current rival Katie Couric…as well as all of their nemesis, the Internet.

Here is Williams’ anniversary thank you:

Here is NBC’s congratulatory video, showing him being all newsy n’ stuff:

…and here are some of the more important thank-yous: from loyal viewers. Those who have read the Daily Nightly and have taken the time to read down through the comments will discover possibly one of the nicest commenting communities on the Internet. Seriously. Lisa McNeil from Alpharetta Georgia is particularly famous for wishing Brian, Richard Engel, Lester Holt, and pretty much everyone who has worked at NBC ever a heartfelt “PEACE” after every broadcast, and a small roster of regular commenters are now buddies in every comments section on the DN…and now on Twitter, which I discovered to my delight a few weeks ago. I asked a few of them if they had any wishes for BriWi to mark his anniversary, and this is what I got (don’t worry, BriWi, it’s safe to read them):

Dear Brian,

Congrats on 5 years in the big chair! With all the opinions that are spouted on cable news and online, I appreciate your objectivity. I’m grateful that there’s still a place where I can get my news without some sort of spin. Your warmth and personality add to the many reasons I choose to watch Nightly News every evening. Wishing you continued success and many more years in the anchor chair.

Lori (AKA Lori ~ NKY from my Daily Nightly posts)

and…

Dear Brian,

Congratulations on five years in the anchor chair! I remember the passing of the torch well – such big shoes to fill – you must have been intimidated! It sounds like a cliché, but you have truly made “Nightly” your own. I watch every day – even record it, if I know I will not be home in time. My 70-year-old mother watches you, too. She thinks you’re suave – an adjective previously only reserved for the late, great Peter Jennings (whom you sort of resemble). We appreciate both the humanity you bring to your work (New Orleans, post Katrina; Iraq; Afghanistan) as well as the humor – whether on the broadcast, or on “The Daily Show,” or “SNL.” You’re our permanent 6:30 date. Cheers to you, and to many more anniversaries.

A loyal viewer and “Daily Nightly” devotee,

Laurel Noel Potyen, a.k.a. “lnp, 38, leonardtown, maryland, usa”

…and, with years ahead in the demo:

Dear Mr. Brian Williams,

I want you to know that you made me realize what I want to do when I “grow up”, and also that that very fact scares me to death – or more so, it makes me extremely nervous because I’m actually pretty shy.

I want to send my deepest congratulations and thanks for all of the amazing work you and your colleagues have put into NBC Nightly News these past five years. So much has happened in those years, including a visit to my own town that all of us wish had been in completely different circumstances. So many sad stories over the five years you’ve been invited into our living rooms across the country. But in those difficult times, you’ve always been there for us.

You’re my first inspiration into journalism, and with the close relationship you have with your viewers, I also feel like you’re my very first mentor.

On behalf of all of your wonderful viewers, thank you again for all that you do! Congratulations, and here’s to five (or ten?) more years!

With love from your young loyal viewer,
-Cary (or Cary Skelton 20, Roanoke, Virginia)”

…and finally, Lisa McNeil from Alpharetta, Georgia:

Dear Mr.Williams,

CONGRATULATIONS on FIVE YEARS WITH NBC Nightly News! I have been a loyal viewer of NBC Nightly News and my parents always watched NBC Nightly News. I think you have done a wonderful job anchoring for these five years and have watched you since you began anchoring. You are so deserving of all the awards and recognition and you have great people working with you. I have learned so much about you through your blog the “Daily Nightly” and you have made me laugh so much at your great dry humor. You have an AWESOME sense of humor! It has been wonderful!

You coverage of Karina,Iraq,Afghanistan and many other reports is just remarkable and your really bring the best to every story you cover. I look forward to you broadcast everynight! And I look forward to many,many more years of great broadcasts.

Thank You and My Deepest Congratulations to You!

As I always say at the end of all my comments,

Peace to You and to All!

Lisa McNeil
Alpharetta,Georgia

So there you have it! Five years of BriWi, including SNL, 30 Rock, and about a zillion TV appearances. Probably in five year’s time Bruce Springsteen will be opening for him. I hope he can sing.

Update: Here is another, longer video collection of highlights from Williams’ career. Includes Bono!

Okay so — we all know it by now, Brian Williams has a life outside of NBC from 6:30 – 7pm, Monday – Friday. Yes, people were skittish when he hosted SNL (yawn) but that was two years ago — he’s been on Leno, Conan, Jimmy Fallon, Jon Stewart, the Emmys, Ellen, Bonnie Hunt and who knows what else since then (inlcuding, btw, a quick cameo on 30 Rock). So — we get it. He’s funny.

That’s why I was surprised by this promo video for tonight’s ep of 30 Rock, in which BriWi seems to doth protest way more than necessary that no really, he’s not funny, he’s just a newsman. “I hope people understand that a couple of months from now I’ll be in Afghanistan being shot at,” he says, reminding me of his repeated assurances two years ago that the Nightly News was “Job One” and how “stewardship of journalism at NBC” was safe. Well, it’s an easy claim to make two years later from the top of the ratings (though Diane Sawyer awaits!) and having just returned from your second trip to Afghanistan since then to boot. The irony is that now he no longer needs to make that claim — two years ago, it really was novel to have Brian Williams on SNL; now, it’s part of the progression of an alterna-career that by now we’re pretty used to. So BriWi, stop apologizing — the news is safe, and so are you — at least until you join Lester Holt on the Today Show set in a dress.

BTW all that said, I particularly liked these two quotes from his 30 Rock cast mates: (1) Tina Fey: “He really knows his way around a joke, and he’s always available” (ha – according to the relative frequency of my Google alert for him vs. Charlie Gibson, he really is) and (2) Judah Friedlander “It’s always fun when you have guys that people are so used to seeing play very serious roles on TV – not that he’s playing a role but you know he’s usually very serious.” I’m sure BriWi loved that one.

Clip below of the 30 Rock pre/promo-interview and, just to remind you that Brian Williams is a serious journalist, a little something extra.

Related in BriWi Doing The Same Thing Before He Hosted SNL:
In Bloggo Gravitas: BriWi On SNL, In His Own Words [ETP]

The 2009-2010 season will see a big change, as Diane Sawyer assumes the anchor chair from Charlie Gibson on ABC’s World News. But after 13 seasons on top – will ABC or CBS be able to catch NBC?

Here’s some of the press release:

“Nightly” had its best total viewer delivery and best total viewer advantage over “World News” since the 2005-06 season, and the best total viewer advantage over “Evening News” since the 1994-95 season. “Nightly” has now won 13 consecutive seasons in total viewers.

Versus the 2007-08 season, “Nightly” was the only newscast to show year-to-year growth. “Nightly” added +88,000 viewers this season, while “World News” dropped by -363,000 viewers and “Evening News” lost -103,000 viewers. Both ABC and CBS had their lowest-ever total viewer season deliveries since at least the start of the People Meters.

People meters started in September 1987, which means this was ABC and CBS’ lowest total viewer average in at least 22 years. With the trends the way they are, it’s likely the lowest in far longer than that.

Which serves to make NBC’s win that much more impressive. Despite the excitement of the 2008 election, which helped cable news but never had a huge impact on the broadcast networks, NBC grew year-to-year. And as viewers leave the network news in higher and higher numbers, for a variety of reasons, NBC has maintained a comfortable lead.

But now Sawyer will come in and shake it up. On the week of the announcement, ABC actually surpassed NBC, albeit for one week only, in the ratings. Will Sawyer’s presence help ABC cut into NBC’s lead, or open up a chance for Katie Couric to thrive. We’ll see in January.

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The last transition was just a few years ago, but oh how things have changed. Today, the news that Charlie Gibson is leaving ABC’s World News after only a few years in the top spot is definitely news, but is shaking no foundations. It’s also not at all surprising who is replacing him: Diane Sawyer.

And why should it? Sawyer’s got a track record a mile long. She’s an accomplished journalists, well-known to ABC viewers over the year, a longtime partner of Gibson and equal to him in stature at the network, as well as in the upper echelons of that news ecosystem.

Well, for one thing, Sawyer’s a woman.

A woman!

Remember when that was a big deal? Cast your mind back to 2006. Katie Couric had just been announced as the successor to Dan Rather (or, really, Bob Schieffer), and the entire media community was in a tizzy. What would she wear? Would her hairstyle change? Would we still get to see those famous legs? I’m serious; this was the subject of legitimate debate in legitimate news outlets. The coverage of Couric’s ascension to the top spot at CBS, at its core, was about how viewers would react to a pretty, perky woman delivering their nightly half-hour news round-up.

Over at ABC, Sawyer was not impervious to that trend. The spring of 2005 had seen a spate of Katie-vs-Diane stories over the GMA/Today Show ratings, and after Bob Woodruff‘s terrible accident in Iraq ended the pairing of he and Elizabeth Vargas leading the broadcast in early 2006, both Gibson and Sawyer quietly started maneuvering for the anchor position.

According to Howard Kurtz in Reality Show, his book chronicling the anchor wars, Sawyer and Gibson were in contact about the ascension possibilities, as partners on GMA for eight years prior, but there were definite backroom goings-on as well. There was more: Sawyer also felt the added weight of the Couric treatment, very much aware of how the media would treat them as competitors:

It would be like every movie that featured two women battling it out. Women made great copy, that was the way the popular culture worked… She did not want her evening news tenure to be viewed through that prism. If she went to Darfur, the stories would be all about how she was trying to demonstrate that she was more interested in the plight of refugees than Couric was. She would be cast in a catfight.

We all know what happened: Gibson took over the ABC anchor chair. Couric took over at CBS. Sawyer remained at GMA, ever valuable to the network. Come January, she’ll finally be making that switch from morning to evening, to one of the hallowed Big Three anchor chairs.

Why bring all this up now? Things seem so different now, don’t they? Katie Couric has been on the job for three years now, and when it comes to waving scalps, Sarah Palin‘s is a pretty decent one to have claimed. Gibson’s depature from the chair is news, certainly, but as previously mentioned it won’t rate the kind of wall-to-wall coverage of the Brokaw-Williams handover, so carefully brokered and so seamlessly managed back in December 2004. New media upstarts enjoy dancing on the grave of the nightly news almost as much as they do that of newspapers. 20+ million viewers though the Big Three claim each night, there’s no doubt that the timeslot is not the big dog it once was.

Things are different — but that’s why it’s worth noting. Katie Couric’s been leading the CBS Evening News for three years and it’s still on the air (albeit with diminished ratings share). Charlie Gibson, for all his XY-chromosome-ness, never did manage to permanently unseat Brian Williams from that top spot. And in truth, there could not be a more perfect replacement for Gibson at ABC than Diane Sawyer, whose reporting chops, professionalism, longevity and on-air authority make her the ideal for a seamless transition.

But — looking ahead, there will be stories about how it’s BriWi vs. The Girls, and real data there, too, about whether or not viewers are switching over. There will be catfight stories, especially if ABC and CBS start getting close in the ratings or double-dealing for big-time exclusives. There will be assessments of Sawyer’s wardrobe choices and hairstyle, comparisons with the choices Couric makes and has made (here’s a potential headline: Will Diane Sawyer Cut Her Hair? Katie Did!). Looking ahead is made somewhat easier by looking back, and the fact that those articles about Couric’s wardrobe may have been in 2006, but chatter about Hillary Clinton‘s pantsuits and Sarah Palin’s Naughty Monkey pumps are decidedly more recent.

Looking ahead, those will be the stories — but so, too, will be the story of how a longtime ABC stalwart with an award-winning career took over one of the most important posts, still, in news — and the whole thing didn’t fall apart. That’s the thing about progress. It just sort of happens.