Anderson Cooper decided to quit his moonlighting job at "60 Minutes," but not without a few words interpreted as "a dig" at CBS News Editor-in-Chief Bari Weiss.
In an "Overtime" video reviewing his CBS career, Cooper proclaimed: "There's very few things that have been around for as long as '60 Minutes' has and maintain the quality that it has," and "I think the independence of '60 Minutes' has been critical."
Always beware the I-word. "Independence" is code for "crusading liberal bias." We at "60 Minutes" demonstrate our "independence" by trashing Donald Trump on a weekly basis.
Cooper often didn't sound "independent" when interviewing Democrats. Just start with the 2022 interview with Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. Sending one famous gay liberal man to interview another famous gay liberal man didn't sound like it would be hard-hitting, and it wasn't.
Cooper asked Buttigieg a series of bland softballs, such as: "When somebody's driving over a bridge, should they feel confident?" Cooper finished the segment by noting the engineers who gave America a C-minus on infrastructure hoped Team Biden would take it up to a B. Cooper gushed to Buttigieg: "Have you ever gotten a B in your life? You strike me as the kind of guy who hasn't gotten a lot of Bs in your life."
In 2018, Cooper supportively interviewed porn star Stormy Daniels and her sleazy lawyer Michael Avenatti, part of their "Get Trump" formula. Cooper pointed out to Daniels: "Melania Trump had recently given birth to a son, just a few months before. Did he mention his wife or child at all in this?" No.
Cooper asked Daniels if she was physically attracted to Trump (no) and did he use a condom (no). "I thought of it as a business deal," she said.
This wasn't "independent" at all from all the other liberal channels giving Stormy and Avenatti endless minutes of conspiracy chatter, including Cooper's CNN.
In 2019, Cooper platformed Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), who'd been in office for a few weeks. He noted that Ocasio-Cortez was proposing some radical goals, like no use of fossil fuels within 12 years. "What you are talking about, just big picture, is a radical agenda compared to the way politics is done right now." AOC replied by comparing herself to Lincoln signing the Emancipation Proclamation and FDR establishing Social Security.
Cooper did not reply, "Your ego, madam, is off the charts." Cooper could only ask, "Do you call yourself a radical?" Ocasio-Cortez said, "Yeah." How "independent" does that sound?
That's not to say Cooper couldn't be tough on socialists. It all depends on it being carefully timed, like during Democrat primaries. In February of 2020, Cooper came at presidential candidate Bernie Sanders from the right, insisting he'd been wrong to praise Fidel Castro's communist regime. "A lot of dissidents (were) imprisoned in Cuba," he said. Cooper also found a hypocrite: "Though he's campaigning as an advocate for the poor, Bernie Sanders became a millionaire four years ago, thanks largely to royalties from his bestselling book, 'Our Revolution.'"
Cooper hasn't been shy about celebrating CBS, including on CNN. After CNN ran a live performance of George Clooney's fact-mangling play about CBS heroes in the McCarthy era last summer, Cooper brought on his CBS colleague Scott Pelley for a promotional interview about his anti-Trump commencement speech at Wake Forest. The hour was titled "Truth and Power."
"Truth" is a buzzword, like "independence." CBS beating up Trump, Newt Gingrich or multiple George Bushes was "truth" in action, and promoting Obamas, Clintons and Bidens was somehow "independence."
Tim Graham is director of media analysis at the Media Research Center and executive editor of the blog NewsBusters.org.
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