The Media Research Center resorted to name-calling to defend Bari Weiss as head of CBS News in an Oct. 16 post by Curtis Houck:
In what will hopefully be the first of many welcome changes at CBS News in this Bari Weiss era, senior vice president for standards and practices Claudia Milne announced Thursday she would be leaving the company after having played leading roles in what our friends at the New York Post noted were “some of the network’s recent controversial, woke reporting” in recent years.
For reference, the Post’s indefatigable media reporter Alexandra Steigrad explained the standards and practices unit at news organizations are “responsible for the moral, ethical and legal implications of CBS programming,” so her departure marked the “the first senior executive to leave the network since Weiss” was named editor-in-chief on October 6.
Steigard, as always, came armed with sources. She found one who said Milne “was part of the woke mob at CBS News” and thus “Bari’s first scalp” as she seeks to move CBS back towards the center.
Steigard reminded readers of Milne’s past controversies, most notably her order in 2023 that CBS News journalists were not to make “any mention” of the fact that the Covenant Christian School shooter in Nashville, Tennessee was transgender.
We noted at the time that this was proof they would rather kowtow to the style guide mob at the far-left GLAAD than the facts from law enforcement.
Houck failed to explain why any of this made Milne “woke,” whatever that means, or why her failure to make a point of a small detail the MRC was obsessed with made her a slave to the “far-left GLAAD,” how how, exactly, anything she did is “woke” whatever that means. Or, for that matter, what makes a right-wing media reporter like Steigard “indefatigable.”
Houck spent an Oct. 29 post cheering that dozens of CBS News staffers were laid off on Weiss’ orders:
Wednesday was a grim day at CBS News as reportedly around 100 people were axed as part of long-rumored layoffs numbering 2,000 people across its parent company Paramount Skydance. The ranks of those let go were vast and deep with both remaining CBS Saturday Morning hosts shown the door, correspondents with decades of experience (and all women), its Race and Culture unit, and even two entire shows.
Houck cheered the departure of one host in particular:
Despite having only been on the air since February 10, CBS Evening News Plus’s demise was far less surprising given anchor John Dickerson’s Monday announcement he would be leaving the network at year’s end.
Status’s Oliver Darcy reported Monday that Dickerson’s departure had been in the works for some time given the pompous, liberal anchor’s tilt bearing little resemblance to what editor-in-chief Bari Weiss is building.
That said, we’re selfishly sad to see Evening News Plus head out to pasture as Dickerson’s end-of-show commentaries were rife with partisan, pompous sneering.
Houck concluded by cheering further: ‘”s elitist, legacy, liberal media continue to lose both credibility and viewership, this marked the latest set of major layoffs at third-place CBS News.”
Houck followed up the next day:
In his indispensable Wednesday night dispatch at Puck News, Dylan Byers reported on the latest inside CBS News following layoffs of nearly 100 people and suggesting there’s more than smoke to rumors of editor-in-chief Bari Weiss expressing interest in having 60 Minutes correspondent/CNN host Anderson Cooper become the next CBS Evening News anchor.
But Byers also did something his fellow former CNN media colleagues wouldn’t be caught dead doing, which was deliver a reality check to leftists viewing Weiss as “some Laura Loomer-Sarah Palin-Marine Le Pen horror show.”
First, Byers said “the vast majority of this week’s layoffs” — which were leveled across the board at parent company Paramount Skydance — “were put in place by CBS News president Tom Cibrowski…and in some cases were set in motion before” Weiss even arrived on scene.
[…]But on that note, Byers said Weiss herself will conduct further “cuts to the newsroom in the near future,” which won’t so much be for Paramount Skydance to trim costs as it will be “to better align personnel with her own editorial vision and mandate[.]”
Houck did not explain why Weiss dragging CBS to the right wing was a good thing (for people not right-wing activists like himself, anyway). He also didn’t explain why Byers’ report is “indispensible” while Darcy’s media reporting makes him a “far-left authoritarian prick.”
Tim Graham, meanwhile, cheered a potential departure of his own in a Nov. 3 post:
As liberals inside and outside CBS News panic over how new Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss is going to “ruin” it to the center, Variety reported last Thursday that Gayle King is “expected” to exit her co-hosting job at CBS Mornings when her contract expires next May. CBS denied that quickly.
But we have long noted that King is a radioactively glowing symbol of liberal bias, donating many thousands to Democrats before she signed up in 2012, and outraging insiders in 2017 by vacationing on a yacht with the Obamas.
New York Times reporter Jodi Kantor noted King and her longtime best pal of Oprah Winfrey, partied after midnight with the Obamas in the White House after Barack’s inauguration celebration for “their family and closest friends” in 2009. She’s also close friends with liberal Sen. Cory Booker (D-New Jersey).
Note that Graham cited no evidence of anything King actually did while working for CBS — only extracurricular activities outside of work. Yet that makes her a “radioactively glowing symbol of liberal bias” according to Graham.