The British socialist newspaper The Guardian is upset that CBS News might become less radical, publishing an article provocatively titled “‘Blood in the water’: Bari Weiss’s chaotic first three months in charge of CBS News.” They want Bari to bleed. This spin announces an agenda: Weiss Must Be Stopped! The Left cannot stand any outlet on their side moving two degrees toward the center. Any tiptoe to the middle is “anti-journalism.”  Any hint at an opposing conservative view is a slippery slope to “misinformation.” Guardian “media & power reporter” Jeremy Barr quoted a pile of anonymous CBS staffers in service to his anti-Weiss agenda. He referred in this story to a previously unreported November 6 “blow-up among staffers about language choices when writing about transgender individuals.” A “prominent correspondent” – which Semafor reporter Maxwell Tani claimed was legal correspondent Jan Crawford – sent an email that said CBS “should refrain from adopting terminology advocated by the movement,” referring to guidance from the Trans Journalists Association’s stylebook. A producer responded angrily to the email, writing: “It’s a TJA style ‘guide’ – that’s what I’m trying to do. Guide us to better coverage.” They define “better” as “accepted by our ideological allies.” Now this is where the rubber meets the road. Wokeness dominates the elitist media. “Style books” are surrender manuals to ideological manipulation of terminology. Facts are shredded in favor of feelings. So you get Orwellian terms like “gender-affirming care” to describe trying to erase your actual gender. This is why Barr & Co. hated new CBS anchor Tony Dokoupil’s proclamation that “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.” Transgender ideology is a perfect example. They believe advocates and elites should tell the undereducated “average American” what to think and how to talk. The Trans Journalism Association demands that “better” coverage means you avoid any reference to actual biological facts in deference to the transgender imagination. Reality is whatever they decide it is, it’s “gender-expansive.” So you get instructions like these: “Avoid references to being born female or born a girl, etc.” That’s too factual. When it comes to removing breasts or penises, “Terms like ‘mutilation,’ ‘sterilization,’ and ‘social contagion’ invoke common misinformation and disinformation.” This is because they are the spreaders of the “social contagion,” but hate the description. They hate the term “culture war,” because they aim to win it without a real battle. Don’t mention biology. “Noun phrases like biological men, biological males, biological women, or biological females are often used by anti-trans groups to invoke a person’s assigned sex at birth as their ‘real’ gender, in contrast to their gender identity.” You have to love “real” in quotes. Don’t say the ideologues are ideological. The term “gender ideology” is described as “a charged term commonly deployed by anti-trans commentators and activists that implies trans people, merely by being trans, are participating in a political activity or have a political agenda.”  They are. That’s obvious. That’s why they are intimidating the media into a political lingo. Then they double down: “There is no such thing as transgenderism any more than there is a ‘gay agenda’; the -ism as used in transgenderism implies that a trans person’s gender is a political philosophy, not a demographic characteristic.” But it is obviously a philosophy, which seeks to dominate by insisting it’s not. Their own messaging on Instagram boasts of “shaping journalism into the industry we deserve” and “transforming the journalism industry” and urging people to “Support The Movement.” But don’t call it ideological! 

The British socialist newspaper The Guardian is upset that CBS News might become less radical, publishing an article provocatively titled “‘Blood in the water’: Bari Weiss’s chaotic first three months in charge of CBS News.” They want Bari to bleed. This spin announces an agenda: Weiss Must Be Stopped! The Left cannot stand any outlet on their side moving two degrees toward the center. Any tiptoe to the middle is “anti-journalism.”  Any hint at an opposing conservative view is a slippery slope to “misinformation.” Guardian “media & power reporter” Jeremy Barr quoted a pile of anonymous CBS staffers in service to his anti-Weiss agenda. He referred in this story to a previously unreported November 6 “blow-up among staffers about language choices when writing about transgender individuals.” A “prominent correspondent” – which Semafor reporter Maxwell Tani claimed was legal correspondent Jan Crawford – sent an email that said CBS “should refrain from adopting terminology advocated by the movement,” referring to guidance from the Trans Journalists Association’s stylebook. A producer responded angrily to the email, writing: “It’s a TJA style ‘guide’ – that’s what I’m trying to do. Guide us to better coverage.” They define “better” as “accepted by our ideological allies.” Now this is where the rubber meets the road. Wokeness dominates the elitist media. “Style books” are surrender manuals to ideological manipulation of terminology. Facts are shredded in favor of feelings. So you get Orwellian terms like “gender-affirming care” to describe trying to erase your actual gender. This is why Barr & Co. hated new CBS anchor Tony Dokoupil’s proclamation that “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.” Transgender ideology is a perfect example. They believe advocates and elites should tell the undereducated “average American” what to think and how to talk. The Trans Journalism Association demands that “better” coverage means you avoid any reference to actual biological facts in deference to the transgender imagination. Reality is whatever they decide it is, it’s “gender-expansive.” So you get instructions like these: “Avoid references to being born female or born a girl, etc.” That’s too factual. When it comes to removing breasts or penises, “Terms like ‘mutilation,’ ‘sterilization,’ and ‘social contagion’ invoke common misinformation and disinformation.” This is because they are the spreaders of the “social contagion,” but hate the description. They hate the term “culture war,” because they aim to win it without a real battle. Don’t mention biology. “Noun phrases like biological men, biological males, biological women, or biological females are often used by anti-trans groups to invoke a person’s assigned sex at birth as their ‘real’ gender, in contrast to their gender identity.” You have to love “real” in quotes. Don’t say the ideologues are ideological. The term “gender ideology” is described as “a charged term commonly deployed by anti-trans commentators and activists that implies trans people, merely by being trans, are participating in a political activity or have a political agenda.”  They are. That’s obvious. That’s why they are intimidating the media into a political lingo. Then they double down: “There is no such thing as transgenderism any more than there is a ‘gay agenda’; the -ism as used in transgenderism implies that a trans person’s gender is a political philosophy, not a demographic characteristic.” But it is obviously a philosophy, which seeks to dominate by insisting it’s not. Their own messaging on Instagram boasts of “shaping journalism into the industry we deserve” and “transforming the journalism industry” and urging people to “Support The Movement.” But don’t call it ideological! 

In the immediate aftermath of the capture and extradition of strongman Nicolas Maduro and his wife, the situation on the ground in Venezuela has become increasingly  complicated. Only one network has accurately reported on the marauding pro-regime goon squad whose mission is to terrorize everyday citizens into compliance with the regime. Watch the report in its entirety as aired on the CBS Evening News on Tuesday, January 6th, 2026: FINALLY: A legacy media outlet properly identifies and reports on the pro-regime Colectivo goons, loosely modeled after Iran's Basij, that are currently terrorizing Venezuelans. Well done, @CBSEveningNews pic.twitter.com/OwsOGM4cUN — Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) January 7, 2026 TONY DOKOUPIL: CBS News correspondent Lilia Luciano is just across the border tonight from Venezuela. She is in the country of Colombia and she joins us now live. Lilia, good evening. LILIA LUCIANO: Good evening to you, Tony. Look, the further you get from Venezuela, the louder the celebrations. But inside the country, that is not an option because even though Nicolas Maduro is out, the regime is still very much there. There are these armed militias that are called collect Colectivos that have been canvassing the streets of Caracas and cities beyond. Only public displays of support for Maduro are tolerated, and any hint of support for the U.S. can be met with arrest. But it’s not just civilians that are on edge. Last night, gunfire rang out near the presidential palace, and it turns out that it was the military shooting down some commercial drones. And here at the border, you can feel the volatility. As you can see, there are these armored trucks that are here, part of a major deployment from the Colombian military, in order to prevent or to control any possible spillover of violence or migration. Tony. DOKOUPIL: Yeah, Lilia. You can feel it, you can see it as well. Thank you very much. Those of you who remember Iran’s 2009 Green Revolution will recall how citizens were terrorized by the Basij: marauding bands of thugs affiliated with the regime, who went around shooting protesters. The Colectivos operate based upon a similar model.  It is not uncommon to watch the Colectivos come down the mountains, resembling a large motorcycle caravan where everyone is armed. They were armed, by the way, after law-abiding Venezuelans were disarmed by the state following the death of Hugo Chavez. They are deployed, as are the Iranian Basij, when there is civil unrest due to protests against the government, and have a mandate to shut protests down by any means necessary. These Colectivos respond to Interior Minister Diosdado Cabello, the regime’s chief goon. Cabello activated the Colectivos after Maduro was detained. This explains why the Venezuelan streets seem muted despite the forcible removal of the regime’s leader. CBS is the first among the network newscasts to bring this critical awareness to viewers, and for that they should be commended. Oliver Darcy might cry again. So be it.

What, you may ask, has sent Oliver Darcy into hysterics again? The sanctimonious media scold is in full meltdown mode over the newly revamped CBS Evening News, publishing a hysterical review on his Status newsletter. Let’s face it: the Evening News had sucked on skates well before Bari Weiss came aboard as Editor-in-Chief of CBS News. Norah O’Donnell couldn’t pull the newscast out of its perennial third place hole, and the product really went off a cliff when she was run off stage in favor of the John Dickerson and Maurice DuBois-led Evening News. As I noted less than a year ago: In the words of George W. Bush, this is some weird ****. The suckitude of the Evening News was magnified by the network’s historic reputation for being a horribly biased news product. Recent lawsuits only aggravated that perception among the public. The news division clearly needed a change of direction (read Curtis Houck's review of the new Evening News here). But the media reporting class, which fancies itself the gatekeeper of what we read or watch, have a problem with news reporting that deviates one inch from whatever the Democrat party orthodoxy might be on any given day. Among these, Darcy is the most obnoxious and sanctimonious.  What triggered Darcy’s latest outburst? This funny segment that closed out the newscast. What sent @oliverdarcy, the living incarnation of Angry Soyjak, into Chernobyl-level hysterics tonight? This report to close out the @CBSEveningNews pic.twitter.com/Pz7Bkq03yM — Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) January 7, 2026 TONY DOKOUPIL: Finally, tonight, and only in America, the many lives and many jobs of Marco Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants and a former Florida senator, he is now the face of U.S. foreign policy and President Trump's point man on Venezuela. All in addition to his roles as Secretary of S, interim National Security Advisor, and acting National Archivist and USAID chief. Whatever you think of his politics, you've got to admit, it's an impressive resume. And now, AI memes have added to that portfolio, casting secretary Rubio as the new governor of Minnesota, the new shah of Iran, the prime minister of Greenland, the new manager Manchester United, the head of Hilton Hotels, and highest of high honors of all, the new Michelin Man. Now back in real-life, of course, these memes may not add up to much, but for Rubio's hometown fans, which are many around here in Miami, it is a sign of how Florida, once an American punch line, has become a leader on the world stage. Marco Rubio, we salute you. You’re the ultimate Florida Man. A goofy segment relative to the current news cycle was just a bridge too far. Darcy bleated: On Tuesday evening, newly installed "CBS Evening News" anchor Tony Dokoupil closed out just his second official broadcast with a surreal segment: a glowing tribute to Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Kicking off his “Live from America” tour with a broadcast from Miami, Dokoupil ran through Rubio’s ever-expanding portfolio as one of Donald Trump’s closest confidants. Then, in an attempt to create a lighthearted moment, the broadcast aired a montage of A.I.-generated memes depicting Rubio in a variety of imagined roles—including as the head of Hilton Hotels. “Marco Rubio, we salute you,” Dokoupil declared. “You are the ultimate Florida man.” Even under normal circumstances, an ostensibly objective newsman’s lighthearted praise of a cabinet member’s political portfolio would have been jarring. But it was particularly striking in context of the last several days. Rubio is currently helping Trump pursue the fantastical goal of capturing Greenland, and only days earlier participated in the shock overthrow of Venezuela’s government. That the "Evening News" would cap its broadcast with a meme-driven homage to a central player in those events was, to put it mildly, an extraordinary editorial decision. One can almost hear the exaggerated Olbermannesque intonation when reading “extraordinary editorial decision.” And not to belabor a point, but that’s an interesting choice of words given CBS’s anteWeissean history. God forbid a conservative Cabinet official have a moment in the zeitgeist. One does not recall similar huffery after the nation was forced to smell the media’s farts over the manufactured “Brat Summer,” but here we are. Darcy would also complain about a report on Kristi Noem before getting to the crux of the matter: whining about the changes made at CBS News. The anonymous staffers buried the new newscast, pointed to Dokoupil’s one teleprompter flub as proof evident of a standards collapse, and emoted about working at the old CBS News.  And that’s really the purpose of this screed- whining about the way things were. Darcy writes: In any event, the larger question remains about what-if anything-all these changes being made will achieve, It is incredibly difficult to move the needle on broadcast television. Viewers are creatures of habit and siphoning them off other newscasts is a formidable task. If anything, it is more likely that Dokoupil’s recent antics will alienate the network’s existing audience, compelling them to sample the competition, not vice versa. Says who? If public confidence in the news media is at an all-time low, who’s to say that viewers won’t go for the vice versa? This hysterical rant, both from Darcy and from his anonymous sources, is about little more than compelling CBS to hold the line and continue to push nuance-free Trump-deranged slop disguised as news. Viewers be damned.  

Normal people are breathing a sigh of relief that narco-terrorist leader Nicolás Maduro is finally getting his just desserts for getting fat off of the torture of his citizens and funneling drugs into the U.S. for years. For MRC Business, it’s a moment worth recalling when the idiotas at The New York Times made their readers dumber by blaming anything but communism and socialism for Venezuela’s destruction. The July 28, 2024, story that Times Venezuela reporter Anatoly Kurmanaev, international correspondent Frances Robles and Andes Bureau Chief Julie Turkewitz ran was so bad it was enough to make people lose IQ points: [I]n recent years, the socialist model has given way to brutal capitalism, economists say, with a small state-connected minority controlling much of the nation’s wealth. Yes, the journos actually attempted to make Maduro and Venezuela’s bread lines synonymous with — *checks notes* — “capitalism.” How the heck three Times authors, including a bureau chief, didn’t sense the irony in blaming “capitalism” while kvetching about a “state-connected minority” as if the two terms are anything other than mutually exclusive boggles the mind. The MRC pointed out then that the authors should have taken the time to read one of their paper’s own prominent columnists, Bret Stephens, and his 2019 piece headlined, “Yes, Venezuela Is a Socialist Catastrophe.” For Pete’s sake! It’s not even as if the authors needed to read any text outside their own paper to realize that their hot take was dumber than a bag of hammers.  Even the radical Communist Party of Great Britain praised Maduro in a 2016 piece headlined, “ Maduro ‘ready to radicalise the revolution.’” The piece ended with the chant: Viva Chávez! Viva Maduro! Viva Venezuela! Viva la revolución Bolivariana! Earth to the Old Gray Lady! Independent Institute Senior Fellow Phillip Magness blasted The Times at the time for continuing “a long line of left-wing apologia around the repressive Chavez and Maduro regimes that have ruled Venezuela for a quarter century.” There’s even a 2021 video of Maduro extolling Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels’s infamous Communist Manifesto as “the most important political declaration in 200 years.” The Times authors pretended like this didn’t exist in their agitprop. “Brutal capitalism?” Ha! Don’t make us laugh. But what more can be expected from The Times, which has a long, sad history of covering up for oppressive communist regimes, such as the Stalinist kleptocracy under notorious Moscow Bureau Chief Walter Duranty’s insidious propaganda.  Apparently the ghost of Duranty still haunts the editorial rooms at The Times. After nearly 100 years since Duranty’s butchering of truth to gaslight the world over the harrowing realities of the Holodomor genocide inflicted by Stalin on the Ukrainian people, The Times’s most recent behavior in covering up Venzuela’s oppression by communism is further proof why no one should ever take the paper’s coverage seriously ever again.