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OP/ED: J6 Hearings Are Mindless Ineffective Political Theater While The Working Class Suffers (6/13/22 9:53 PST) (1 Viewer)

GordonGekko

Footballguy
VIDEO: (Democrats) Bring In TV EXECS To Produce Primetime Jan 6 Hearings | Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar Jun 9, 2022

Krystal and Saagar look at the primetime January 6th committee hearings being produced by cable news execs spearheading the production value of the primetime hearings on cable news

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRA6Q_3dR_w

Direct Headline: Jan. 6 committee faces a thorny challenge: Persuading the public to care

The House Jan. 6 committee has tried to recruit high-profile journalists to write its report about the attack on the Capitol, hoping to build a narrative thriller that compels audiences and is a departure from government reports of yore....Committee members and staffers are seeking to compile dramatic videos, texts and emails in a digital format that is easy....to share on social media. And they want to put together blockbuster televised hearings that the public actually tunes into....

Their challenge: Making the public care deeply — and read hundreds of pages more — about an event that happened more than a year ago, and that many Americans feel they already understand.... with the findings likely a key part of the Democrats midterm strategy. ...Democrats are widely expected to have a tough time in the upcoming midterm elections, with even some Democrats privately fearing a bloodbath....

.....Committee staffers have interviewed writers to assist with the herculean task of quickly turning around hundreds of thousands of pages of depositions, records and other evidence into an accessible narrative....But the committee’s leaders are keenly aware of the difficulty in breaking through to hard-to-reach audiences....The committee has discussed the potential for criminal referrals should it produce enough evidence to support those findings. But unlike the Mueller report, the Jan. 6 committee’s narrative work will not be bound... to decipher what acts of criminal liability it could prosecute — giving them more room to produce compelling reading....“The Justice Department might decide that Trump is not criminally liable for his actions but that the committee is able to provide at least a high standard of proof that Trump was morally liable ....”

.....Committee member Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) “was most interested in that: how do we make the report tell a story? How do you take the different pieces of the story that are produced by a very large group of people and make it sing? And I think that’s very much what they would like to do.....”.....“There’s one-third of the nation that will read it, one-third that might read it, and one-third that won’t even believe it...”.....The lawmaker added that even some of their Democratic constituents have lost interest in the committee’s work because of more pressing issues, like inflation and the coronavirus pandemic....“Investigators need a certain sense of showmanship — they really need to demonstrate and dramatize what’s happening because the public is distracted...”

By Jacqueline Alemany and Josh Dawsey March 18, 2022 at 6:00 a.m. EDT

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/03/18/jan6-committee-journalists-report-hearings/

Direct Headline: “People Must Pay Attention. People Must Watch”: The Jan. 6 Committee Is Trying to Make the Most of Its Prime-Time TV Slot 

...Veteran network executive James Goldston, the former president of ABC News, “has joined the committee as an unannounced adviser,” Axios reported Monday. The committee tapped Goldston, whose storytelling expertise breathed life into programs such as Nightline, to shape the cache of material that the committee has amassed over the past year....Some committee members have also taken it upon themselves to generate hype for Thursday’s 8 p.m. hearing, including Rep. Liz Cheney. The vice chair of the committee... said.... “And so, people must pay attention. People must watch....” Asked by CBS News’ Robert Costa whether she is “confident that what you have found as a committee will somehow grab the American people by the lapels and say, 'Wake up: You have to pay attention’?” Cheney replied, “I am.” .....

....Among the broadcast networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC are planning to carry Thursday night’s hearing live, with David Muir, Norah O'Donnell, and Lester Holt anchoring, respectively. Jake Tapper and Anderson Cooper will anchor CNN's special coverage, beginning at 7 p.m; Rachel Maddow, Nicolle Wallace and Joy Reid will also begin anchoring at 7 p.m. over at MSNBC....

"Most Americans don't like what happened on January 6, but rate it pretty low on their importance list when compared to inflation, cost of gas and the border,” Rep. Don Bacon, a Nebraska Republican who represents a Biden-won district, told CNN....Two Republicans who got nixed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) from serving on the select committee are expected to play key roles in blunting the panel's message: Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana and Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio....

By Terry Moseley and Charlotte Klein June 6, 2022

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2022/06/the-jan-6-committee-is-trying-to-make-the-most-of-its-prime-time-tv-slot

VIDEO: I Watched The January 6 Congressional Committee Hearing So You Didn't Have To Jun 10, 2022 Ben Shapiro

Ben Shapiro watched the January 6 congressional committee hearing and is presenting you with a handful of "highlights" from the "primetime extravaganza".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGUDvh4Fq58

VIDEO: Saagar and Marshall DEBATE January 6th Committee | The Realignment Podcast Jun 12, 2022

Saagar and Marshall Kosloff on the realignment go back and forth on the January 6th committee's primetime hearings impact on the midterms while inflation roils the economy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRPFE_yN6r4

************

“The pain of looking bad is worse than the gain of making the best move.” - Michael Lewis, Moneyball

“You guys are sitting around talking the same old good body nonsense like we’re selling jeans. Like we’re looking for Fabio. We’ve got to think differently.” - From Aaron Sorkin's first draft of Moneyball

The J6 Committee wants you to be excited:

"People must pay attention! People must watch!"

"Compelling thriller narrative!"

"Blockbuster television!"

"How do you make the different pieces sing!"

"Needs a certain sense of showmanship!"

"Let's dramatize what's happening!"

"Taken it upon themselves to generate hype!"

"Grab Americans by the lapels!"

"A captivating multi media presentation to produce a blockbuster!"

"Make the most of it's PRIME TIME TV SLOT!"

The current J6 hearings are mindless ineffective partisan political theater by Team Blue. They are desperate to save themselves from an all out massacre for the coming Mid Terms and the 2024 general cycle because they are embroiled in failures and scandals non stop such as the Border Crisis, Afghanistan, Baby Formula, inflation, gasoline prices skyrocketing, Energy Crisis, COVID19 response, push back against "Culture Wars", angry parents about claims of children being indoctrinated and sexualized, eroding America's national security and foreign interests, rising housing costs, the homeless crisis, the rioting and looting in 2020/2021, Defund The Police, growing justified fears of Biden's cognitive capability, "bail reform" and public policy in Big Blue Cities that enable criminals and lawlessness, seen as complicit in enabling threats against SCOTUS, and on and on and on.

Do most Americans care more about a three-hour riot more than 18 months ago amid a year filled with nationwide rioting, looting and burning?

Do most Americans care when they are facing real life day to day struggles like the cost of food on the table for their children, paying rent and putting gasoline in their cars so they can go to work?

Do most Americans care when Team Blue spent years and years, at the cost of countless millions of your tax dollars,  promising that they finally had the magic elixir to get rid of Donald Trump and end his political career for good, but again and again, they just failed miserably?

Do most Americans care when it's becoming more and more clear that Team Blue won't be able to convict Trump and put him in prison over J6?  ( Both Trump and Schumer's "speech" alike, while unethical and repugnant, are protected by the Brandenburg Test. And no one can get Trump on obstruction because it's close to impossible to prove "specific intent" without some kind of smoking gun that the Committee clearly does not have, otherwise they would have used it already)

Will most Americans trust the words of Team Blue here, when they hired a long time TV producer to try to spin a J6 "thriller", whom also happens to be the same guy that buried the Jeffrey Epstein story from becoming widespread news that would dominate the national daily media cycle? He'll cover for a pedophile to protect other "brand name" celebrities and politicians, but now he's magically going to start pushing the truth?

Will most Americans trust the words of Team Blue here when Nancy Pelosi only allowed Republicans who were complicit "bought and paid for by corporate political pork" RINOs on board and the Committee carries Jamie Raskin, who literally came out in public right after the 2016 election to lead the charge to challenge the electors when Trump won?

Let's just play out this song and dance for it's true purpose - A final report that will be published ahead of the November Mid Terms and findings will be used as a desperate attempt to convince the American people that they should keep voting for the Party in power that inflicted massive inflation upon them. And while gaslighting the public by telling them their concerns only mean they are "distracted" from the oh so important J6 narrative. 

Ben Shapiro makes a good point. If you have that "smoking gun" then hit fast, hit hard and release it first and foremost. Because people are tired of hearing about how Team Blue has finally got Donald Trump and this time they'll put him in prison. When it's clear they can't and they won't even admit in public that Trump committed any formal crime. Being a 4th rate failed reality TV star and unhinged narcissist that behaves in a toxic manner that's often wildly unethical and irresponsible isn't a crime. Some of you radical leftists here want it to be, but being an exhausting trolling total d0ucheb@g is not an actual crime.

Saagar Enjeti makes several good points. People have moved on and are focused on their needs to survive today. And that why aren't there hearings on Afghanistan and how that devastated America's national security. Also why aren't there hearings with Big Oil? Or with the food industry? ( Of course there won't be, because it lends too many potential negatives for the Military Industrial Complex and the corporate donor overlords that Team Blue must "bend the knee to" in absolute terms)

And Enjeti points out what I've been pointing out non stop - If you want real change, if the Democratic Party wants certain laws, policies and judicial outcomes, then deliver wins for the working class American people, make their lives better and just win a crap ton of elections because then the masses will actually want to come out and vote for you.

What political theater like these hearings are doing is to try to convince working class Americans and the masses that despite a failure to deliver wins for every day common people,  that you should just blindly keep voting for the establishment in current power that keeps screwing you over as if some "messaging" spin built on failed hype is going to put food on the table for America's children.

Is Team Blue trying to sell jeans here?

Are they looking for Fabio?

These elected officials, barely hiding their activist grifter greed, on the J6 Committee are paid with YOUR TAX DOLLARS. They are supposed to be working for ALL OF YOU. Does anyone here believe that they really approach professional politics that way?

They want to convince you that you don't just need two and half more years of this disaster of an administration, but that you need another four more years of chaos on top of that. Because they see you as a child that's easy to manipulated and that you just don't know any better and they are here to guide you like sheep to the slaughter.

I do not agree with what Trump did on J6. It was not in keeping with what was best for America overall. But the response can't be worse than the disease itself. The response like the J6 Committee is turning politics into some kind of bizarre team sport, but the stakes instead will be if your children will starve or not.

Team Blue is begging Americans to watch. And ratings show most aren't giving a damn at all. They are tired of it. Because it's exhausting to watch this sad pathetic display where Trump's stupidity was met head on with a totally repugnant charade that makes it clear all freedom before us is going to be incinerated for sport.

I'll leave this here for others to discuss.

 
CONTEXTUAL MATERIAL:

VIDEO: Jan. 6 committee members decline to say whether Trump committed crimes Jun 12, 2022

Members of the Jan. 6 select committee on June 12 declined to say whether former president Donald Trump should be prosecuted for the Jan. 6 Capitol attack

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ofg63VXu9b0

Direct Headline: Scoop: Jan. 6 committee's secret adviser

The House's Jan. 6 committee has turned to a renowned former network news executive to hone a mountain of explosive material into a captivating multimedia presentation for a prime-time hearing Thursday.....James Goldston, former president of ABC News, and a master documentary storyteller who ran "Good Morning America" and "Nightline," has joined the committee as an unannounced adviser....Goldston is busily producing Thursday's 8 p.m. ET hearing as if it were a blockbuster investigative special. He plans to make it raw enough so that skeptical journalists will find the material fresh, and chew over the disclosures in future coverage. And he wants it to draw the eyeballs of Americans who haven't followed the ins and outs of the Capitol riot probe....

At least two of the broadcast networks will interrupt evening programming for live coverage anchored by ABC's David Muir and CBS' Norah O'Donnell.....

Mike Allen Jun 6, 2022

https://www.axios.com/2022/06/06/jan-6-committee-adviser-james-goldston

TWEET: Kevin McCarthy XX@XXGOPLeader

The Democrats have turned to the former ABC News exec, under whose leadership ABC spiked a story on Jeffrey Epstein, to choreograph their Jan 6 political theatre. 

Nov 18, 2019 :I am deeply concerned that ABC News chose to bury the truth about Jeffrey Epstein's role in human trafficking. XX@XXRepDougCollins, XX@XXRepMcCaul and I sent a letter to the President of XX@XX ABC News requesting more information about their enabling of Mr. Epstein.

Image Of Letter From McCarthy

Goldston/ABC Cover Up For Epstein?

1:27 PM · Jun 6, 2022

https://twitter.com/GOPLeader/status/1533908533489573889

8:25 AM · Nov 18, 2019

https://twitter.com/GOPLeader/status/1196464431770804224

VIDEO: Fmr ABC News Pres. James Goldston producing the Jan. 6 Hearing; Spiked Amy Robach’s Epstein story Jun 9, 2022

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPZRhijg2Lc

VIDEO: Leaked ABC News Insider Recording EXPOSES #EpsteinCoverup "We had Clinton, We had Everything" Nov 5, 2019

Good Morning America Breaking News Anchor, and 20/20 Co-Anchor Amy Robach.... “It Was Unbelievable… We Had Clinton, We Had Everything…We Had Her Whole Allegations About Prince Andrew…I Got a Little Concerned About Why I Couldn't Get On....She Had Pictures, She Had Everything. She Was in Hiding for Twelve Years. We Convinced Her to Come Out. We Convinced Her to Talk to Us..."  ...."We would not put it on the air. Um, first of all, I was told “Who's Jeffrey Epstein. No one knows who that is. This is a stupid story"....The Palace found out that we had her whole allegations about Prince Andrew and threatened us a million different ways....So do I think he was killed? 100%... Yes, I do…He made his whole living blackmailing people... Yup, there were a lot of men in those planes. A lot of men who visited that Island, a lot of powerful men who came into that apartment…There will come a day when we will realize Jeffrey Epstein was the most prolific pedophile this country has ever known...I had it all three years ago.....”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lfwkTsJGYA

VIDEO: Rep. Raskin Challenges Awarding of Electors Jan 8, 2017

Congressman Jamie Raskin (MD-08) objects to votes of electors from Florida on the House floor. House Democrats challenged the validity of electoral votes on January 6, 2017.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxEr_mRpp44

 
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20mil turned out to watch the first night.  For todays TV viewership that’s a pretty large number and runs counter to your quote above. It’s also higher then any non Super Bowl show I could find for 2022   

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/13/1104529512/analyzing-the-television-ratings-for-the-first-hearing-on-the-jan-6-insurrection


20 million LIBERALS of course.  ;)

But, still, 20 million is a pretty big number.  That's just a smidge under all of the posters I've schooled and beat down with facts and knowledge in here.  :lol:

 
20 million LIBERALS of course.  ;)

But, still, 20 million is a pretty big number.  That's just a smidge under all of the posters I've schooled and beat down with facts and knowledge in here.  :lol:
Sure I’d certainly guess that the majority of people that watched were left leaning. But it also wasn’t carried on right leaning networks, like Fox. So to say the ratings were terrible, well the stats just don’t show that. 

 
Last edited by a moderator:
dkp993 said:
20mil turned out to watch the first night.  For todays TV viewership that’s a pretty large number and runs counter to your quote above. It’s also higher then any non Super Bowl show I could find for 2022   

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/13/1104529512/analyzing-the-television-ratings-for-the-first-hearing-on-the-jan-6-insurrection


Typical Thursday Night Prime Time (Average Viewership):

NBC airs Law And Order SVU -  4.5 Million

CBS airs Young Sheldon - 7 Million

ABC airs Station Nineteen - 5 Million

**********

Most of the major commercial broadcast television networks preempted their regularly scheduled programming on Thursday to show continuous live coverage of the two-hour hearings. ( Fox opted out, CW is not in this part of the game, PBS is non commercial but aired the hearings)  I'm going to add in MSNBC and CNN because it's part of the aggregated numbers. On the fringe,  FBN,  CNBC, Newsmax and NewsNation got less than 600K combined. )

NBC-  3.56 million

CBS - 3.37 million

ABC - 4.88 million

MSNBC - 4.16 million 

CNN - 2.62 million. ( They've been averaging about a fifth of this normally, so David Zaslav can get at least one restful night of sleep this year)

*********

25-54 Age Demo:

CNN < 750K,000  ( Average night < 150K)

MSNBC < 580K  (Average night < 110K)

Why does key demo range matter? You are getting American citizens in their prime earning years. These are the people, particularly parents and suburban women voters,  who are hit hardest by inflation. Inflation rose 8.6% in May projections. This is the highest recorded figure since 1981. This is also where the groundswell of the risk of losing working class minority voters, including legacy votes, emerges for Team Blue.

That's the thing you aren't considering. People who are watching and who aren't watching all have to deal with same relentless massive inflation with no relief in sight. That is a perpetual daily drum beat when they look at their kids in the morning, when they fill their gas tanks to go to work, when they worry about bills, when they can't sleep at night over finances.

********

The viewership in aggregate that watched the hearings ( to be fair, ratings for traditional broadcasts are still projections based on antiquated techniques)  was less than the Big 5 average by themselves on a nightly basis. And this was the first night, if you don't deliver something hard hitting to start ( basic primacy/latency engagement), your progression will hit a free fall.

That's 19+ million with a massive ramp in with unpaid media coverage across all the typical activist complicit hard left leaning players. Then there was the hard push with owned media coverage for countless months beforehand. Think about it, the left essentially controls nearly all of Big Social Media. And they have a lock down on Big Tech, Big Education, Hollywood, Big Finance and major hitters like Soros and Bloomberg. Even with a massive coordinated engagement with an established TV producer, the best they could do was 19+ million?

Earned media coverage engagement here landed flat on it's face. There's no non stop buzz and word of mouth trailing from these hearings. You aren't winning elections with hardened partisans who have already picked their sides. You win by swaying moderates, independents, undecideds and late stage voters by delivering wins for every day people. How do you do that when Team Blue has already enraged parents, the working class ( especially minorities), suburban women voters, the military vote, the law enforcement vote and typically non voters who have no choice but to care because inflation is chewing them up?

What are the practical "neutral" benchmarks, to start, here?

First is the State Of The Union. Biden got roughly 38 million viewers.

Second are the Presidential Debates, the 2020 cycle showed about 73 million for the first and 68 million for the last one. 

So NPR ( paid with our tax dollars to be activist complicit...sigh....) throws a single number at you and you dance around and do the Humpty Dance and jiggle around like a school girl waiting in line to see The Hunger Games for the first time because it fulfills your hard political tribalism?

Did you stop to consider that many Americans, just trying to survive this administrations many scandals and failures brutalizing their day to day lives, had no idea the hearings were airing, thought they were going to see a rerun of SVU or Sheldon and just stuck around by habit until they droned off?

The numbers aren't there. Not to stop a Mid Terms massacre. I'm a retired Tier 1 Media Optics pipe hitting closer. I'm familiar with James Goldston's work. He's an idiot. The entire opening structure of the hearings was incompetent. But he's a loyal woke zealot with some experience. No one with real talent wants to work for Team Blue. That's the thing people don't get here. It's why each disaster looks worse and worse and the spin gets more and more ridiculous. In terms of media optics, Goldston is Krazy 8 while I'm Gus Fring. I wouldn't let that mouth breather wash the trucks in my company motor pool.

Anything less than the 85 million from the first Trump/Clinton debate is a failure. Team Blue does not need to hold onto votes. It needs to make up for lost votes.  How do you make up for lost votes when you are getting numbers that reruns of Young Sheldon would cook?

 
To the OP....   "Ineffective" is the correct term only when it's applied to the far right folks who are dug in and refuse to see what has happened.  FWIW-We ALL know why Fox didn't air the first one, and subsequently why they aired the next one.  

 
Sure I’d certainly guess that the majority of people that watched were left leaning. But it also wasn’t carried on right leaning networks, like Fox. So to say the ratings were terrible, well the stats just don’t show that. 
Right leaning.  And I watched

 
All this work for 12 replies, two from yourself. It's over bud. It was a good run.


VIDEO: Ronna McDaniel: Voters don't want to hear about January 6th Oct 14, 2022

Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel says the Biden administration has turned its back on the 'suffering of American people.'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mcLWeyZE8M


****

"Voters want to hear with what they are dealing with ( in everyday life/basic needs) .... we ( the RNC / Republican Party ) don't want to get sidetracked....Democrats want to talk about abortion and J6, issues which are not resonating with voters, it's not something you are waking up and thinking about every day... so if we stay on message, and talk about the economy and crime...if we do that, we'll win..."
- Ronna McDaniel, RNC


So this is my third reply. Apparently.

Doesn't change the political reality. Ronna McDaniel, for all her faults, has stayed "on message" Talking about what working class Americans need and want. And focusing on that. She's talking about realistic down the ticket impact.

I don't agree with what happened on J6. Lots of Conservatives and Republicans join myself in that sentiment. I don't want Donald Trump in professional politics ever again. Many Conservatives and Republicans also join myself in that viewpoint. But that's entirely a separate issue that the J6 Hearings are a type of deflection from the reality that Biden has run this country into the ground in less than two years into his first ( and hopefully last ) term. What will the next two years bring in terms of woe, suffering and chaos for the American people.

People care what food costs to put on the table for their children TODAY. People care what it costs to put gasoline in their car to go to work and live basic life TODAY. People care about if it's safe or not to walk down the streets in their own neighborhoods TODAY.

J6 was two years ago. It should not have happened. The actions and stupidity of roughly around 4-5 thousand idiots was used to smear all Conservatives and all Republicans in the country. But you have to help working class Americans TODAY if you are the current Party in power. And since the Biden Administration can't do that, they will throw a Hail Mary hoping the majority of Americans can hold outrage for two years running ( actually 7 years running) instead of worrying about how their kids are going to eat or not.

You are right, "it was a good run"

No one on an individual level has done more to impact the PSF than I have in the last two years.
 

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