CBS This Morning co-host Tony Dokoupil on Friday played strategist for Bernie Sanders. Dokoupil suggested that the socialist Sanders just stop calling himself a socialist. He didn’t advise the 2020 candidate to stop being a socialist, just to maybe not call himself that.

Turning into a PR agent, Dokoupil declared, “You have got this label stuck to you, socialist. You have got someone from your own party, the Democratic Party, saying they don't want socialism in South Carolina referring to you. I know there's a difference between democratic socialism and socialism but why do you cling and hold on to that label, Democratic socialist, when it seems to confuse people and give your enemies and critics an opportunity to bash you?”

After Sanders ranted about “the fossils fuel industry receiv[ing] tens of billions of dollars a year in subsidies and tax breaks,” Dokoupil again acted as a worried adviser: “Senator, is the label confusing people and allowing critics to hurt you politically?”

Co-host Anthony Mason offered the tired (and false) claim that the non-Sanders candidates are “moderates,” saying of New Hampshire: “The results there still show a significant split in the party between the moderates and the left.”

A Media Research Center analysis by Geoffrey Dickens explained that Amy Klobuchar, Pete Buttigieg and others are anything but centrists. But with Sanders now leading the entire Democratic field with a frontrunner status, perhaps some in the media will shift to a new strategy: Getting the socialist candidate to stop calling himself a socialist.

As the MRC’s Kyle Drennen explained on February 3, CBS host Dokoupil promoted socialism on the network with... pie:

Viewers of Friday’s CBS This Morning could have been forgiven for thinking they were watching a comedy skit when Dokoupil was shown standing in the middle of a shopping mall asking baffled bystanders if they wanted to talk about economic inequality. After getting several nos and a few odd looks, the morning show anchor held up a pie and proclaimed: “This is the American pie!”

A partial transcript of the segment is below. Click “expand” to read more.