Curtis Houck — the Media Research Center’s chief fluffer of new CBS News chief Bari Weiss — served up more fluff in a Dec. 12 post:
With an appearance on Friday’s CBS Mornings, CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss made her formal on-air debut on one of the network’s flagship newscasts and she made it count as it was to both promote Saturday’s airing of a town hall she had taped earlier this week with Erika Kirk and set the tone for what should be the network’s future of embracing a diversity of views.
The fullest depiction came in the second half of her appearance as featured co-host Vladimir Duthiers echoed the need for honest debate, so he made sure to tell viewers Erika’s late husband “Charlie Kirk was controversial in his life” and “[s]ome of his critics called his organization racist, xenophobic, sexist, homophobic.”
After a long clip of Weiss asking Erika about some of Charlie’s comments that said “critics” would label as incendiary, Duthiers followed up by wondering what Weiss would say to those declaring it “harmful to platform” the Kirks.
Houck declared that Weiss’ answer — typical blather about how “I just fundamentally disagree with the idea that we shouldn’t be able to speak across divides” — was “a response that will hopefully serve as a north star for CBS News and any liberal network looking to regain the public’s trust after decades of self-inflicted hits and overinflated egos.” Houck then fluffed the new host of the CBS Evening News:
Going to break, co-host and incoming CBS Evening News anchor Tony Dokoupil doubled down on this and, while perfectly accurate, need to be repeated over and over going forward in this new era after, again, a decades-long stench of bias:
[I]f you’re watching the news on whatever channel you’re watching, you agree with everything you hear, you’re getting it wrong and second, if you’re only getting those one lines as somehow a summary of a person’s whole life or way of thinking, that’s not true persuasion and that’s not democracy.As we wrote when Dokoupil was named Evening News anchor, count on NewsBusters to continue providing complete coverage of CBS and calling balls and strikes as to whether this new thinking prevails, fails, or is merely lip service.
Of course, the MRC cares nothing about “calling balls and strikes” — its job is to be right-wing partisans, and it will praise Dokoupil when he acts like one and criticize him when he doesn’t. But Houck wasn’t done gushing over Weiss:
Back live, Dokoupil asked Weiss to explain why she had Kirk serve as the lead-off for what will be a series of CBS News townhalls at a time when “there are tough conversations and people often don’t feel they can have them because they can’t speak openly about certain topics and ideas.”
Weiss first stated the reality that, as a result of her husband’s murder, Erika is now leading “the most important conservative organization in the country” and thus will have enormous sway “over the direction of the right, especially after Trump.”
Having said that, Weiss gave CBS News viewers a perspective that was likely unfamiliar to many of their liberal base, which was the country’s in a dangerous place because someone was murdered “practicing the most fundamental of American rights” in “trying to persuade people with words” and the fallout has devolved into celebrations and conspiracy theories:
[…]Co-host Gayle King asked Weiss to weigh in on Erika embracing her Christian faith in this time of enormous pain. Weiss replied that, as someone’s not Christian, Kirk’s belief in Christ was been “powerful” to witness and that someone could hold the duality of forgiving the alleged shooter while still embracing the need for him to face the criminal justice system.
Weiss sure sounds like a right-winger. No wonder Houck is so enthusiastic about fluffing her — to him, she’s a kindred spirit. Needless to say, Houck was not going to mention how badly the Weiss-Kirk town hall did in the ratings.
Houck also bid a not-so-fond farewell to the outgoing CBS Evening News anchors in a Dec. 19 post:
While nowhere near the absurdity of Brian Williams’s December 2021 sign-off from MSNBC, Thursday marked the final show for John Dickerson and Maurice DuBois as co-anchors of the CBS Evening News and with CBS News after less than a year of falling ratings and questions about changing the newscast’s format.
To cap off their last show, the pair went off by waxing poetic about “facts” and “trust” while knocking President Trump and praising their Gaza producer for reporting the news and staying alive.
[…]In formally saying goodbye, they drew one last eye-roll as DuBois channeled Edward R. Murrow by saying “good night and good luck.”
Following a rotating team of fill-ins over the Christmas holiday, CBS Mornings co-host Tony Dokoupil will take the job on January 5. While he’s certainly had quite the character arc and it would not surprise us in the slightest if it became a respectable, centrist newscast, NewsBusters will be there to provide the rigorous oversight you’ve come to respect.
Again, “rigorous oversight” is just MRC-speak for enforcing its right-wing agenda. No actual oversight will take place, given how biased the MRC is. Also of note: the MRC trashed Dickerson and DuBois when their newscast debuted, and it has long hated Dickerson for being, in its word, “pompous.”