Brian, be sure to wipe down your phone with alcohol, I always do that every day, you never know who uses your phone when you’re away from your desk, or who uses your office to make a private phone call !

Extremely fake news reporter Steven Colbert addressing the Senate . . . just want to know who invited him to do so, and who was the person who approved it! Oh well, on to something on a much happier note from yesterdays blog.

After reading Cary’s completion of her “musical homework assignment”, which is attached to yesterday’s blog, I’m sure she gave it her all, because I notice she didn’t tweet anything at all this afternoon !

It got me to thinking of myself back when I was in my 20’s. Brian, you might be the only one who reads this who will know who I’m referring to here (plus if you remember my Birthday wishes to you I called you my 2^nd favorite newsman) I was “Jim Jensen’s Cary Skelton” so to speak, however, that was waaaayyy before all the social technology we have now, so the best I could do was write a letter to him. I remember he did an interview in the Daily News and mentioned that he personally answered all his mail, so, I just about dropped the newspaper at that point and started composing my letter to him (Sorry Brilliams, but I gotta be loyal, Jim will always hold the #1 spot for me, as you will always be Cary’s #1).

Everyday when I got home from work (which btw is right across the street from where you are, McGraw-Hill) I couldn’t wait to check the mail, think it took less than a week, and when my hands stopped shaking and I was actually able to read the letter I was on Cloud Nine, like Cary is now (time to come down now Cary!) It wasn’t a standard “fan mail response” either, he mentioned some of the things that I wrote about and offered a few things about himself, I did hold on to that letter for quite some time, but don’t have it now, I realized their came a time when I kept running into it in my desk drawer that it was time to throw it out, yes Cary, believe it or not, sometime when you’re in your late nineties you will clean out your Inbox and find that email that Bri sent you directly, plus you’ll probably have a cut&paste of your mention on the blog last night, and you will finally decide at the old ripened age of 97 that it’s time to hit the delete button! I know it’s hard to believe now, but trust me, it will happen !

Good Evening Mr.Williams, Another fine broadcast this evening as always! Stay healthy and well with all the colds going around your workplace. It can be hard to avoid. Hope everyone stays well. Looking forward to seeing "Saturday Night Live" this Saturday with guest host Amy Poehler. I'm sure it will be a great show! Very Funny!

Now on to the broadcast. First of all the report by Savannah Guthrie about the appearance of Stephen Colbert testifying before Congress in his character from his show. Many Congressmen were not amused by his comments and questioned him being there, yet he was allowed to stay and speak. Immigration is a conroversial issue and Mr.Colbert using this issue as part of his routine did not go over well with the Congressmen.

Voters are angry with what is being done in government at the moment and this will surely affect people voting at the polls during the Mid-Term elections this November. Time will tell.

The report by Mr.Arouzi about President of Iran Ahmadinejad showed how there are two sides of this leader. After ranting in front of United Nations members he then shows compassion and interest when meeting with Sarah Shourd and her family. A very controversial and not always liked world leader. One only hopes the other two American hikers held in Iran will be released very soon.

The report by Natalie Morales from Chile about the 33 miners trapped now for 51 days seem to be in good spirits and keeping extremely active. Exercising, working is shifts as well as getting food, medicine are allowing the miners to adapt to the existence in the mine. It is good they can talk to their families through the video, but one hopes they will be reunited very soon with their loved ones. Progress is being made on being able to rescue them and oen hopes is comes soon.

Sad to learn of the passing of Eddie Fisher at the age of 82yrs old.

Very moving and truly honorable to see the laying to rest of Vernon Baker, a war hero and Medall of Honor recipient at Arlington National Cemetary.

The "Making A Difference" segment by Mr.Tibbles showed how one woman is really teaching children to save the planet. Having them go through the trash and find things that can be reused certainly is helping many people. It was amazing to see how much they has collected.

Thank You for the broadcast Mr.Williams. Have a wonderful weekend! Peace to You and to All!

Lots of Love to Laurel,Jackie,Stephanie,Claudia,Celine,Anna,Lori,Cary and Matt!

Jackie-I think it was awesome to see you mentioned by Mr.Williams too in the DN posting last evening! Always keeping us informed! Great Job!

Be Well Always!

Stay Extra,Extra Safe and Well Richard!

Take Extra Good Care Richard and Crew!

XOXO

Lisa

Good evening, Brian.

How cool is it that you can see a feed of the SNL rehearsals before the big night tomorrow? I bet that never gets old, and as a longtime fan maybe hasn't even sunk in yet! I'm so excited about the first show tomorrow. You're right, I really miss when SNL isn't on during the Summer, and it seems that when it is on every Saturday night all is right with the world again, as silly as it sounds. Especially when so much is going on in our crazy world, I always wish I could see most of it parodied on SNL. Soon we can! I'm excited.

Sorry to hear of the respiratory illness spreading throughout the newsroom, and hope everyone can get through it and/or avoid it quickly! Best of luck!

Thank you for the broadcast tonight, and all for this week. It was a great surprise to see the Tehran bureau's Ali Arouzi in studio with you tonight! Always great to have his excellent analysis. Also hope that Richard Engel's next trip goes well, and look forward to seeing his future reports.

So sorry to hear the passing of Eddie Fisher last night. I'll be listening to his music tonight in tribute. I think his version of "On The Street Where You Live" (which is a big favorite of mine) sounds a lot like Vic Damone's recording of the same song (which was so beautifully featured in season two of Mad Men.) Both great, both worth the listen tonight!

Wishing you (and all the rest of you) a most wonderful weekend! Have a safe one!

-Cary

SNL still rockin' after all these years...

Hey Brian, good Sir..

Encourage you to cover the many Green Party candidates on the ballot across the country.

Here in Virginia we have full slate of Independent Green Party endorsee/nominees running in every congressional district. That's 11. Two retired Navy Captains, Ron Fisher in 8th, Kenny Golden in 2nd. Retired U.S. Air Force officer Gail for Rail Parker in 1st. U.S. Army vets Jeff Clark in 5th, Jeremiah Heaton in 9th, Floyd Bayne 7th. Harvard Phd Jeff Vanke in 6th. Two real estate brokers, Janet Murphy in 4th, David Gillis (29 years old) in 11th. And finally there's retired U.S. Air Force vet John D. Kelly in 3rd.

http://www.VoteJoinrun.US

The Green Party's Harvard educated medical Doctor Jill Stein running for Governor in Mass just hit matching campaign funds goal today.

In Illnois there's Green Party's Rich Whitney running strong for Governor, and a telegenic LeAlan Jones (34) running for U.S. Senate.

Tom Clements, Green Party candidate for U.S. Senate in South Carolina also impress, as are many more Greens at

http://www.GreenPartyWatch.org/

How lucky you are to be able to watch the feed from SNL! That has to be one of the coolest things.

The respiratory illness came through our house. Somehow it seems to have only struck our kids (knock on wood). We already call our 20 month old daughter "Snot Rocket" so... I doubt I need to elaborate.

I am amused by Stephen Colbert testifying before Congress. What did they expect? I'm thinking they like to invite celebs as a way to get as much face time of their own as they can. Kudos to Stephen Colbert for mocking the ridiculous practice of billing celebrities as "experts" on important issues.

Speaking of making a mockery of things, there are few things I enjoy more than Brilliams slow jammin' the news! "It's not the size of your business that counts, it's what you do with your business." Ha! Highlight of my already great night!

On Thursday's broadcast, Brian Williams read a 25-second story about FDA restrictions on the diabetes drug Avandia. This story contained no video--it was just Brian talking to the camera with a photo of an Avandia bottle over his left shoulder. He also did not mention GlaxoSmithKline, Avandia's manufacturer. It seems obvious that Brian was protecting Glaxo (a frequent Nightly News sponsor) by severely abbreviating this story and refusing to mention the drug's manufacturer by name. On Friday, The New York Times ran the Avandia story on their front page. Here are some facts from the Times story that Brian did not disclose:

*From 1999 to 2009, more than 47,000 Avandia users "needlessly suffered a heart attack, stroke or heart failure, or died".
*The FDA "ordered Glaxo to conduct an independent assessment of the Record trial" after an FDA medical officer found that Glaxo's records of the Avandia medical trials were "riddled with...unpardonable errors that seriously biased the trial's conclusions".
*"Senate investigators found that GlaxoSmithKline spent years hiding from regulatory authorities clear indications that Avandia increased heart risks".
*Glaxo recently paid a $2.3 billion "liability charge related to legal cases involving Avandia and another medicine, Paxil".

Compare Thursday's brief story about Avandia with the story about Avodart (also a Glaxo product) that aired on the March 31 Nightly News. In this story, Robert Bazell took more than two minutes to tell us that Avodart may soon be approved to reduce the risk of prostate cancer, in addition to its currently approved use for shrinking non-cancerous enlargements of the prostate. (During this story, the Glaxo logo appeared on screen twice--in large letters.) It seems that when the news is bad for Glaxo, the story lasts 25 seconds, but when the news is good, the story lasts much longer. But at least Nightly News reported the Avandia story. Last Feb. 18, it was revealed that the zinc in Poligrip (also a Glaxo product) was causing some users to experience numbness in their extremities and to have trouble walking. Glaxo announced that they would be pulling the product from the market until they can manufacture a zinc-free formula. Nightly News did not even bother to report this story. Once again, Nightly News did Glaxo a favor by squelching a negative story about one of their products.

And then there's Aleve. On June 8, Bazell reported a story about an obscure Danish medical study that concluded that Aleve may reduce the risk of heart attacks among its users. Aleve is a frequent advertiser on NBC Universal stations (they advertise on Nightly News almost every night--sometimes twice a night). It's obvious that Bazell and his producers chose to air this story as a favor to Bayer (Aleve's manufacturer). It was a two-and-a-half minute commercial for their product. So as far as Brian Williams, Robert Bazell and and their producers are concerned, if a sponsor's product causes heart attacks, it only gets 25 seconds of air time. If a sponsor's product reduces heart attacks, it gets two-and-a-half minutes. Nightly News should spend the same amount of time reporting negative stories about their sponsors as they do reporting positive stories.

Brian wasn't only speaking to me, he was speaking to all the regular Nightly News Family.  We're one group and we take the bow as one group.  I was glad the news bloggers can see Brian does read our comments and understands us.  Lisa remember you get to the pick and cover the evening news that someone might have missed.  Me I'm all over the place like Peaches said and she knows me well. Cary is the heart/baby of the group and we love and support her.  Laural is special to me she's such a great person.  Stephanie, Lori, Anna, Matt, Shirley W1 and Phyllis.  The list is growing everyday and that's great news but I hope everyone knows we're all friends on this site and support the work Brian and his staff to everyday as we just full in the news that a half hour couldn't get to.  Peaches spoke the truth I love and respect all of the Nightly News Family and your with me all the time.

Hi Brian,

I was so pleased to hear that you are a Neil Young fan. Here in Winnipeg, Neil is a big favorite. He was born in Toronto but moved to Winnipeg in the '40's, moving away for a short while but then returning for the '60's. May be Winnipeg's claim to fame outside of Burton Cummings and Monty Hall :) The Canadian spotscaster, Brian Williams, the name you share, that you met at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, was born in Winnipeg.

And you are so right about music ...."isn't it the most subjective thing in the world? Are any two of us going to agree on any one "great" song, album or artist? Or even genre? I just had this discussion at dinner last night: There isn't enough time in life to listen to all the great music, and more of it is being created every day." I feel that way about books too.

I had meant to comment back on Monday perhaps about Jimmy Carter. Back in 1979 we went on a family vacation to Florida and I was in charge of the maps and I had us stop in Plains Georgia. It was a quaint southern town, Jimmy Carter's town, with a big peanut statue as you drove in and we sat on the porch of a store drinking a cans of Mellow Yellow. It had just been introduced as a soft drink that year to compete with Mountain Dew. The things we remember.

I read somewhere that Jimmy Carter "is widely considered a better man than he was a president." My father used to say something to that effect. I enjoyed your interview with him.....even the "superior" comment.

Stay well. I hear that gargling with Listerine types of mouthwashes and holding it in your throat for a 10 second count may keep colds away. Worth a try :)

Melissa

Brian: Saturday Night Live is an NBC classic. I remember all of the pioneer perfomers who led the way to the current artists which keep this masterpiece going and going and going. Many of the old crew have become big stars and continue to amuse us.

As far as that resporatory problem in the newsroom, maybe you should have your science editor explain to the viewers what that may be. Perhaps it's a Saturday Night Live conspiracy. I'll catch you on Monday's broadcast.

Lester and Brian(old friends), 9-26-10 11:10

Thought this would cheer you guys up. AC/DC- LIVE—(2CDcollection) Song “JAILBREAK” It is best if you turn it up after you download it or to play if you have the CD. IMUS …..for Keith and Kenny I am laughing at you…with you…it cheered me up besides the fact that I am out of the dungen. ha ha. So yall hear the song to you & church!!. This is why I Iove music. A hey to everybody else. Will try to be a church tonight like I should. Been wearing shades all day- eyes of a rough yesterday! Lots of thoughts on my mind- lots of good things only. See yall later. tesa

Hollingsm, Surely you jest!!! Phyllis