The New York Times editorial board voiced the media’s opinion that every day is Jan. 6. But for the rest of the country, the actual Jan. 6 of this year was not Jan. 6, 2021.
Whereas cable and print outlets treated the anniversary of the violent storming of the Capitol with the grave severity usually reserved for 9/11 or Pearl Harbor, Washington, D.C., ignored it entirely.
Thursday featured the rare combination of fresh snow, mild cold, and unobstructed sunshine — yet the National Mall remained empty. Mayor Muriel Bowser spent millions to consecrate the stretch of 16th St NW just north of the White House and Lafayette Square into “Black Lives Matter Plaza” as the de facto center for left-wing protests — yet none appeared to materialize throughout the afternoon.
The space between the White House and Lafayette Square also remained oddly vacant, with just a handful of tourists and the usual vaguely anti-war demonstration camped out front.
Across the Mall, the media grossly outnumbered the very few protesters who showed up to the fenced-off Capitol. One solo protester, wearing a cloth mask outside, held a handwritten sign reading, “Together we can stop Trump!!!!”
Another protester on the west side of the Capitol held a sign reading, “EVERYBODY KNOWS TRUMP IS A LIAR AND LOST FAIR AND SQUARE.” The message, while obviously true, didn’t reach its intended audience, as 2020 election truthers failed to return to the scene of the crime.
Dozens of media members camped out on the east side of the Capitol to cover what turned out to be… well, nothing. Later in the night, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi held a vigil for an event nobody else in the city, let alone the country, even came to observe.
To most people, last year’s Capitol storming was a national humiliation and utter disgrace to our democratic process. It was a travesty that Congress and law enforcement continue to investigate and prosecute.
That very day, Republicans called out Trump for his abhorrent instruction to supporters to go to the Capitol to “stop the steal,” and they certified the victory of the legitimately elected Joe Biden. Ten House Republicans then joined Democrats to make Trump the only president in the nation’s history to be successfully impeached twice, and seven in the Senate voted with Democrats to convict.
While they failed to reach the two-thirds majority required by the Constitution, the conviction vote became the most bipartisan in history. Law enforcement has rightly thrown the book at those nonpeaceful protesters who breached the Capitol barriers, with 701 people facing federal charges and one Florida man sentenced to five years in prison for attacking police officers during the riot.
Meanwhile, both parties have pressed forward on reforming the Electoral Count Act to prevent members of Congress from challenging election results in the future.
Jan. 6 was an awful day. But Congress followed up by making an example of Trump, as did law enforcement by making an example out of the rioters. Meanwhile, the way to prevent this from happening again is to reform the Electoral Count Act.
The rest of the United States has truly moved on. But the media just can’t get over Jan. 6. While the rest of the country is preoccupied with rampant inflation and the Biden administration’s utter failure to distribute coronavirus testing and therapeutics, the press have clung to Jan. 6 as their last resort to rake in the ratings of the Trump era. It helps them keep the man they loathe as relevant as possible.
