CBS News on Monday rebuked one of its star morning anchors, Tony Dokoupil, over an interview that he conducted last week with the author Ta-Nehisi Coates, in which Mr. Dokoupil challenged Mr. Coates’s views about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The episode began last Monday when Mr. Coates visited “CBS Mornings” on a publicity tour for his book “The Message,” which in one section compares Israel’s treatment of Palestinians to the Jim Crow laws of the American South. In describing what he witnessed on a 10-day trip to the region last year, Mr. Coates criticized other journalists for “the elevation of factual complexity over self-evident morality.”
From the start of the interview, Mr. Dokoupil directly challenged this framing, telling Mr. Coates that “the content of that section would not be out of place in the backpack of an extremist.” The anchor added, “What is it that so particularly offends you about the existence of a Jewish state that is a Jewish safe place?”
“There’s nothing that offends me about a Jewish state; I am offended by the idea of states built on ethnocracy, no matter where they are,” Mr. Coates replied. The men parried for several minutes in a tense but civil manner, with Mr. Coates at one point saying: “Either apartheid is right or wrong. It’s really, really simple.”
I just watched the interview, and you can too at this link right here.
Dokoupil was a major asshole as an interviewer. Dokoupil was inserting language as though they were Mr. Coates arguments. Dokoupil was engaging in classic strawman attacks on national TV.
I’ve watched CBS news on and off for years and Dokoupil has been on many of those pieces. Prior to this I thought him competent. I now have zero respect for Dokoupil as a journalist. He allowed his personal feelings and biases to overrule his journalist integrity. He should be ashamed of himself.
Editing to add: If you want to see a good journalist interview the same guest talking about the same book do so here with Jon Stewart and Mr Coates.