Bari Weiss Rises Like a Phoenix, Gets a CBS News Top Spot

AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey, File

I'll be upfront and admit that, while I had a short-lived Free Press subscription, I didn't really read too many of the articles because their uber liberal bent pissed me off royally. One in particular about the military was a bridge too far - I'm pret-tee sure my eyeballs were this close to exploding over the seditious clap-trap in it - and I figure I could wish them well in the enterprise while ignoring it basically for free.

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So I did.

And The Free Press, the rollicking news site that journalist Bari Weiss started after she got canned from The New York Times, has done exceptionally well.

What drew me to Weiss to begin with was her scathing adieu penned to the management, her co-workers, and the owners of the Old Gray Lady when they parted ways.

Hired in 2017 to be some sort of melange voice of conservatives, new writers, and centrists, the unapologetic Israel booster Weiss had apparently a talent for irritating coworkers and editorial types alike. In 2020, it all culminated in an ugly blow-up when she invited conservative stalwart Senator Tom Cotton to pen a piece for the editorial section.

Smelling salts and cries of anguish abounded, along with calls for her head.

Those won out, and Weiss departed the pattern, but not before dropping a flaming bag of legendary dog poopy on the crybabies' front doorstoop.

...It is with sadness that I write to tell you that I am resigning from The New York Times. 

I joined the paper with gratitude and optimism three years ago. I was hired with the goal of bringing in voices that would not otherwise appear in your pages: first-time writers, centrists, conservatives and others who would not naturally think of The Times as their home. The reason for this effort was clear: The paper’s failure to anticipate the outcome of the 2016 election meant that it didn’t have a firm grasp of the country it covers. Dean Baquet and others have admitted as much on various occasions. The priority in Opinion was to help redress that critical shortcoming.

...But the lessons that ought to have followed the election—lessons about the importance of understanding other Americans, the necessity of resisting tribalism, and the centrality of the free exchange of ideas to a democratic society—have not been learned. Instead, a new consensus has emerged in the press, but perhaps especially at this paper: that truth isn’t a process of collective discovery, but an orthodoxy already known to an enlightened few whose job is to inform everyone else.

...My own forays into Wrongthink have made me the subject of constant bullying by colleagues who disagree with my views. They have called me a Nazi and a racist; I have learned to brush off comments about how I’m “writing about the Jews again.” Several colleagues perceived to be friendly with me were badgered by coworkers. My work and my character are openly demeaned on company-wide Slack channels where masthead editors regularly weigh in. There, some coworkers insist I need to be rooted out if this company is to be a truly “inclusive” one, while others post ax emojis next to my name. Still other New York Times employees publicly smear me as a liar and a bigot on Twitter with no fear that harassing me will be met with appropriate action. They never are.

There are terms for all of this: unlawful discrimination, hostile work environment, and constructive discharge. I’m no legal expert. But I know that this is wrong. 

I do not understand how you have allowed this kind of behavior to go on inside your company in full view of the paper’s entire staff and the public. And I certainly can’t square how you and other Times leaders have stood by while simultaneously praising me in private for my courage. Showing up for work as a centrist at an American newspaper should not require bravery.

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She was just warming up in those paragraphs.

The youngish employees, emoting through tiny fisted temper tantrums over the nerve of Weiss's meanness, wanted her fired and proved her point all at the same time.

THAT MEAN JEW LADY IS A NAZI NAZI NAZI

...Times employees then called on Weiss to be fired for criticizing young colleagues on a platform where they could not defend themselves, Vice reported.

In 2021, Weiss started The Free Press, built on the idea that there should be a table everyone could argue at, which is how it should be.

The Free Press is a new media company founded by Bari Weiss and built on the ideals that once were the bedrock of great American journalism: honesty, doggedness, and fierce independence. We publish investigative stories and provocative commentary about the world as it actually is—with the quality once expected from the legacy press, but the fearlessness of the new.

Originally called Common Sense, we focus on stories that are ignored or misconstrued in the service of an ideological narrative. For us, curiosity isn’t a liability. It’s a necessity.

Expect debates, scoops from trusted reporters, provocations from those thinking outside the lines, and live events that bring people with different views together into a truly diverse community. 

You won’t agree with everything we run. And we think that’s exactly the point.

It did really well, garnered a lot of praise for its wide-ranging views and voices and I think has somewhere north of 155K paid subscribers.

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Weiss is a staple on podcasts, and is active in defending Israel through all this Palestinian drive madness.

So now she's not only a Nazi, she's a Zionist, too.

She's also going to be relatively well-to-do, as Paramount is rumored to be buying The Free Press for a reported $200M, as well as naming Weiss the new CBS News editor in chief.

Paramount Skydance is poised to name Bari Weiss as editor in chief of CBS News in the coming days — giving the hard-charging journalist unusual clout to revamp the struggling network as it also acquires her scrappy news site the Free Press, The Post has learned.

Weiss — a 41-year-old former New York Times opinion writer who has built the Free Press into a buzzworthy site with a contrarian bent — is expected to be named to the top post in a Monday announcement, although the talks are in flux and the timing could change, a source close to the situation said.

In a remarkable reshuffle of CBS News’ decades-old management structure, Weiss will report directly to Paramount Skydance Chief Executive David Ellison as she helps set the editorial direction at the Tiffany Network’s third-place news division, a source close to the situation said.

Man. People are hatin' hearing about it.

I came across a substack complaining she's a phony and too far right to be the centrist she fakes being.

Now there's a twist.

Despite the occasional urge, I’ve chosen not to write about Bari Weiss for ten years now, and I still don’t feel like doing it. Whatever my views of Weiss’s work, I don’t do hit pieces, and I don’t attack other journalists.

But the rumored ascendancy of Weiss to be editorial director of CBS News is all that’s on my journalistic mind right now. So I’m going to write about it.

Why do I care about this? First, I have many close friends and colleagues who think that Weiss really is who she says she is —an aggrieved centrist-liberal who finds herself “politically homeless” — instead of who she actually is, which is a lifelong conservative whose heavily-subsidized endeavors push a consistently right-wing, anti-liberal line. They trust someone who has consistently betrayed that trust.

Second, as I wrote about a year ago, I have seen firsthand how the rage and hyperbole that Weiss promulgates drives people apart and contributes to the Putinesque free-for-all that has come to dominate our culture. Her publication is degrading our public discourse: exaggerating, misleading, and enraging. She really is doing harm. And she is soon, it seems, to have an even larger platform to do so.

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The Hamas crowd is torqued.

She's not any old Jewish Nazi, you know.

She's GOEBBELS

Talk about having lost the bubble.

There were some lovely little accolades hidden in the vitriol spewing across X about the news, though. 

So where will this take CBS News when it all goes down?

I am intensely interested to see if there's a palpable change in tone. There has already been a moderation with the two Evening News hosts, who are starting to grow on us, but their field coverage is still full of unhinged vipers like Debora Patta and their D.C. staff.

And it won't only be the Evening News affected - Weiss will have her hand in the entire division, which is already rumored to be having progressive palpitations at the mere thought of her.

...Others expect the new leadership structure to create a strain on the already “dug in” culture at CBS at programs like “60 Minutes,” which recently elevated longtime assistant Tanya Simon to executive producer.

It would be like dropping a grenade” in the newsroom, one former CBS News veteran told The Post last month, of Weiss’ addition to the network.

“They are used to doing things their way,” another source said of CBS News and “60 Minutes” veteran staffers.

News of a potential partnership has sparked anger at the news division, which has been under fire over its alleged left-leaning bias.

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That alone is worth the price of admission.

Weiss has been through the fire and brimstone herself and built her own valuable commodity from scratch. I don't see tantrums from the prima donnas at 60 Minutes or The Evening News having any effect.

Water off a duck's bad, or what would be worse for the offenders, fuel for Weiss's creative fires.

I wouldn't underestimate her.



 

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