Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

OPINION:

Jan. 6 seemed like the height of stupidity, until the months that followed

As we’ve marked the first anniversary of the domestic terrorist attack on the U.S. Capitol, you’ve no doubt read much about how it was one of America’s darkest days.

That’s accurate, of course. But we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that it was also one of America’s dumbest days: A violent pack of conspiracy-addled mopes, following the lead of a dullard’s dozen of dime store grifters, broke into the halls of American democracy and desecrated the place while posting selfies and livestreaming themselves effectively shouting, “LOOK, MA, I’M DOIN’ A FEDERAL CRIME!”

It was veritable tornado of stupid, inspired entirely by claims about the 2020 election that a less-bright-than-most boll weevil would recognize as a bunch of hooey.

The insurrection was a horror and a disgrace, and it left more than a hundred Capitol Police officers injured, some severely. It was a shock to America’s conscience.

But it was also unbelievably dumb. The kind of dumb where if you know someone even tangentially involved in what happened that day, or even if you know someone who supports what happened, you feel ashamed for that person and for yourself for knowing someone so willfully blockheaded.

In the wake of Asinine-a-palooza, one might think Americans would unite in agreement that displays of abject stupidity are profoundly embarrassing to those behaving in abjectly stupid ways.

Sadly, that is not what happened. The Jan. 6 attackers, in many right-wing circles and from the mouths of sitting GOP members of Congress, have been hailed as either heroes or misunderstood patriots. Many of the insurrectionists have been shocked — SHOCKED, I TELL YOU! — to learn they will now be incarcerated for their actions, and some feel let down that their hero, disgraced former one-term President Donald Trump, did not come to their rescue.

I don’t meant to sound rude, but if you allow a man who fleeced people with a phony university and misused funds from his own charitable organization to incite you to battle police, break the doors and windows of a federal building and disrupt the nation’s peaceful transfer of power on his behalf and expect that man to have your back, you’re dumb as paint. And I say that at great risk of insulting paint.

It’s important to note the “dumb” and “stupid” I’m referencing here have nothing to do with a person’s level of education. There’s an abundance of highly educated dumb-dumbs, as well as ample brilliant and sensible souls who never set foot in college.

But what we’re struggling with is a sea change from the times, not terribly long ago, when unabashedly flaunting ignorance — willful or otherwise — was looked down on. People in general tried to be informed and intelligent, or at least stay in their lanes, and babbling on about utter nonsense was drunk-at-the-end-of-the-bar behavior.

Now that behavior seems a prerequisite for a speaking slot at the Conservative Political Action Conference or a guest spot on Fox News.

A portion of the populace has slid from “it’s good to be smart” to “being smart is elitist, so I’m going to follow the medical advice of this podcaster,” a painfully common epitaph throughout the pandemic.

You can draw a straight line from the glorification of numbskullery and the rejection of facts to the Jan. 6 attack.

Yet somehow, since Jan. 6, the stupidity being peddled has only gotten worse. Trump and an astonishing array of Republicans and right-wing media types continue to insist the 2020 election was stolen. There is zero evidence to support that and, in fact, even the former president’s most loyal flunkies who have ham-handedly “audited” election results in various states have come up with zilch.

But the lying continues, eroding faith in our democratic systems and, for some reason, not embarrassing those who keep getting proven wrong.

Fox News host Tucker Carlson produced an entire (baseless) series claiming Jan. 6 was some kind of false flag operation. Yet he still has a job. Why? Because the people who watch and trust him are allergic to critical thinking and find it perfectly reasonable that Carlson, as he did recently, criticizes President Joe Biden for wearing a mask outdoors and then almost immediately slams Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for not wearing a mask outdoors.

That kind of cognitive dissonance should be embarrassing for Carlson, his network and all who lap up such nonsense. But it’s not.

The attempted coup of Jan. 6 is ongoing. The lies that sparked that day’s attacks continue, and they’re leading to nefarious state-level power grabs by Republicans and out-in-the-open promises that future elections will be won by the GOP, whatever it takes.

Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger said last week that there were nearly 10,000 threats against lawmakers in the past year, more than double what it was just a few years ago.

Unchecked stupidity is inherently dangerous. That’s why it’s important to recognize the doltish gullibility behind Jan. 6 and make people feel embarrassed if they behave like lunkheads.

A new poll from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that about two-thirds of Americans believe the Jan. 6 riot was “extremely or very violent” (it was, unquestionably) and about 70% think Congress should keep investigating the events of that day.

That’s good news. At least two-thirds of Americans haven’t let the cheese slide off their crackers.

As to the rest, to the broken-brained deniers and election-fraud dead-enders, let them know this: Jan. 6 was a date that will live in idiocy. It was the charge of the not-bright brigade. It was and remains a global embarrassment.

Anyone who says otherwise is perpetually in danger of being outwitted by a can of tuna.

Let’s make stupidity embarrassing again. Our democracy depends on it.

Rex Huppke is a columnist for the Chicago Tribune.