The Most Important Story From The January 6 Hearings

As anyone with a TV or newspaper well knows, the news media have relentlessly pounded us with coverage of the January 6 Congressional hearings. ABC Nightly News has at times devoted almost a third of their airtime to reportage from the Capitol, complete with Jon Karl shamelessly plugging his book while ostensibly pretending to be a man on the scene reporter (“As I write in my book, Betrayal…”). Every major TV network but Fox carved out blocks of their prime-time space in an attempt to recapture the glory of the Watergate years. And, of course, the cable news networks are in a lather.

What happened on January 6 was indeed big news. It was very ugly. It was also a futile gesture. And it handed the Democrats – the very people many storming the Capitol believed to have illegitimately attained power through ballot box chicanery – talking points to carry them right through to the midterms. Anyone thinking rationally that day should have seen it. But, from Donald Trump on down, we see that rationality gave way to raw emotion and a frustration that stemmed from utter disbelief that over 81 million could cast their ballot for an uninspiring, corrupt septuagenarian, who is the consummate DC insider. Not to mention a candidate so obviously mentally enfeebled that he was relegated to meticulously choreographed Q&A sessions from his basement with journalists so overtly biased they may as well have been on the DNC payroll. And who knows, maybe they were?