The Media Research Center — particularly writer Curtis Houck — have been obsessed with promoting Bari Weiss as the new head of CBS News and Tony Dokoupil as her chosen anchor the CBS Evening News. Jorge Bonilla gushed over Dokoupil in a March 3 post:
The media hall monitors will undoubtedly boo and hiss and shout “MAGA-CODED” into their screens after watching Tony Dokoupil’s latest commentary to close out the CBS Evening News.Instead of sticking to Elitist Media narrative, Dokoupil gave viewers an honest assessment of Iran’s long history of aggression against the United States.
Another sign that people will see Dokoupil’s commentary as “MAGA-CODED”: Bonilla devoted an entire post to praising it. And he found a lot to praise:
This recital of facts was surprisingly fair. It was a serious recital of history for the purpose of informing the viewer on the history between the Khomeinist regime and the United States. This runs counter to the media’s multi-front narrative attack, front-loaded with catchphrases meant to evoke Iraq, such as “war of choice” and “no clear plan.”
It wasn’t that long ago that Dokoupil’s predecessor would deliver overbearing editorials on the short-lived CBS Evening News Plus. These were little more than self-righteous invocations of history, stuffed to the brim with pompous piety, that ultimately served little purpose beyond informing viewers that Orange Man Bad. This was thoughtful, tonally neutral, and free of narrative.
The media hall monitors will shriek, as they always do. The new and, yes, improved CBS Evening News is still a work in progress. They don’t get everything right, as we often point out in this very space. But they got it right this time.
The fact that hall monitor Bonilla is only shrieking in delight at Dokoupil’s diatribe tells us about the right-wing bias Dokoupil is playing to.
Houck returned to whine in an April 1 post:
Columbia Journalism Review provided its contribution Tuesday to the seemingly never-ending liberal, elite media pile-on against CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss and CBS Evening News anchor Tony Dokoupil. This time, it focused on Dokoupil with a nearly 4,000-word story filled with anonymous, petty smears, lame attempts at media analysis, and a general disgust with the stated promise of Dokoupil that he sees, values, and wants to work for all Americans.
In other words, Dokoupil (and Weiss) have promised to build a newscast and network that believes Trump voters have value and should feel seen even though their peers find them detestable and icky.
CJR staff writer Amos Barshad tipped his hand with the headline and subhead: “What’s Up with Tony? How Tony Dokoupil went from being a hair model to a print journalist to the anchor of CBS Evening News, guided by the principle ‘We love America.’”
Houck then complained that Dokoupil’s newscast wasn’t right-wing enough:
Dokoupil’s newscast and CBS writ large still have a long way to go. On many nights, their shows are indistinguishable from past anchors and sets of leadership. But here we see America’s most esteemed journalism arbiters telling the public that the mere promise to regain the trust of Americans who’ve abandoned legacy media is a bridge too far and thus must be condemned.
Houck groused about another insufficiently laudatory article on Dokoupil in an April 24 post:
Two days before the White House Correspondents Dinner (WHCD), Vanity Fair’s Aidan McLaughlin published on Thursday a nearly 3,800-word gossipy tome filled with anonymous current and former CBS News correspondents and producers trashing editor-in-chief Bari Weiss and “useful idiot” CBS Evening News anchor Tony Dokoupil, seething over anything and everything already pilloried in past hit pieces (like here, here, here, and here) from other magazines and journalism outfits.
The difference, however, is the soapiness of current CBS News officials attacking Dokoupil as a “vanity”-filled personality who “completely lost the room” when he acknowledged a lack of trust in the press, “parrot[s] Israeli talking points,” a partisan shill for speaking to “conservative commentator” Douglas Murray after the U.S. struck Iran, and seeking analysis from CBS News contributor Aaron MacLean, who previously worked for Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR).
[…]cLaughlin began with a retread of Dokoupil’s first night, including the script edits that resulted in a mangled teleprompter and has, nearly four months later, proof he and Weiss have no idea what they’re doing.
Boasting this “was an inauspicious start for Dokoupil, a hospital-drama-handsome morning host,” he scoffed that “Dokoupil has presented himself as a relatable face in touch with the country’s problems and an antidote to the partisan politics of an increasingly polarized nation.”
For all his whining about the anonymous sources used in the article — something the MRC has no problem with if that source pushes right-wing narratives — Houck did not prove anything to be actually false. Instead, he praised CBS for no cooperating with the article:
CBS unsurprisingly didn’t participate and were certainly right given the whiny tabloid result. They did, however, fire off a statement blasting Vanity Fair for seeking “unnamed sources…to peddle old and false rumors,” which “won’t stop Tony and his team from…reporting the news and telling the truth.”
The statement was further solidified when, in the same section of the article, McLaughin said the CBS newsroom is “rife with tension,” “paranoia,” and “palpable fear.”
Houck went on to complain about the article’s “rehashing of old takes” — even though the MRC does the same thing when it suits its agenda (Ted Kennedy, anyone?) — and concluded by grousing:
McLaughlin left readers with the predictable ratings scorn which, to be fair, aren’t great. That said, the newscast has been in third place for at least a generation.
He also left readers with the perfect admission of the elite media being, despite many inside the profession claiming otherwise, decidedly left-wing and any attempt to ensure the rest of the country is felt heard and worked for is not welcome:
You mean like how Houck and the MRC treat anyone who’s not a right-winger is not welcome?