Let’s all resolve to root for the right stuff in 2026.
That includes cheering on Bari Weiss and CBS News, because America needs strong, vibrant news organizations with heft and reach who can do stuff that needs doing that other organizations simply cannot do.
Those who are carping, criticizing, and condemning need to show some patience and understanding.
Here is Joe Klein in a recent edition of his Substack;
So let’s talk about Bari Weiss. There has been a big hoo-hah on the left about her ascension to the presidency of CBS news. The drones have been targeted her way since her journalistic venture, The Free Press, was bought for $150 million by the Ellisons, who were, simultaneously, seeking approval a big media merger from the Trump administration. As Jonathan Chait recently argued:
[E]ven if Weiss’s objections were completely merited and followed procedure, it is impossible to take them at face value given the context in which she is operating.
By this logic, in order to maintain her credibility, Weiss would have had to make a bold stand in favor of the DEI and the flaccid illiberalism into which CBS News had fallen. Indeed, the opposite is true: Weiss’s larger purpose in delaying the 60 Minutes story about the CECOT prison may be, I hope, to challenge the prevailing culture and assumptions of network news, to try something new—something, I’d hope, as smart and fresh as The Free Press, which surprises and challenges me almost every time I click on. Here is the important thing about Weiss: she is, defiantly, not a populist.The Free Press is clever and complicated—and it eschews the fake news and foolish pap of the Trumpist right, as well as the inane wokery of the left. It is the best sort of honest broker: variable in its points of view, and vehemently written. If Weiss turns CBS into a sibling of The Free Press, the sanity caucus will be thrilled. It is a voice we need.
One of the first big decisions that Bari has made is about the evening flagship program.
The new “CBS Evening News with Tony Dokoupil” starts Monday, and Tony went to Grand Central to cleverly brand and promote:
Watch that here.
Tony also wrote this statement of purpose/philosophy, that is serious, sober, and shrewd — and was just released:
A lot has changed since the first person sat in this chair. But for me, the biggest difference is people don’t trust us like they used to.
And it’s not just us. It’s all legacy media.
I get it. I’ve been hearing about it from just about everybody, for more than 20 years, as I’ve traveled America on assignment. My mom’s neighbors in West Virginia. My own neighbors in New York City. Thousands of conversations in between.
Sometimes they want to talk to me about our coverage of NAFTA or the Iraq War. Other times, it’s about Hillary Clinton’s emails or Russiagate. Or more recently, Covid lockdowns, Hunter Biden’s laptop or the president’s fitness for office.
The point is that on too many stories the press has missed the story. Because we’ve taken into account the perspective of advocates and not the average American. Or we put too much weight in the analysis of academics or elites, and not enough on you.
I know this because, at certain points, I have been you. I have felt that way too. I have felt like what I was seeing and hearing on the news didn’t reflect what I was seeing and hearing in my own life. And that the most urgent questions simply weren’t being asked.
So here’s my promise to you tonight and every night as long as I sit in this chair: you come first. Not advertisers. Not politicians. Not corporate interests. And, yes, that does include the corporate owners of CBS. I report for you.
Which means I tell you what I know, when I know it and how I know it. And when I get it wrong, I’ll tell you that too. It also means I’m going to talk to everybody, and hold everyone in public life to the same standard. And because I became a journalist to talk to people. I love talking to people about what works in this country, what doesn’t, and not only what should change, but the good ideas that *never* should. I think telling the truth is one them.
I’m Tony Dokoupil, the anchor of The CBS Evening News. Hold me to it.
Root on Tony, root on Bari, and have a great 2026.
Mark
