As we speak, the Republican National Committee is reeling from its statement that condemned Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger for words that claimed their role in the January 6 Committee is persecuting people who were "engaging in ordinary political discourse".
It's an interesting moment in the January 6 Insurrection Drama.
Since they made that statement, prominent Republicans have been not only distancing themselves from the statement, some have outright condemned it. Republican Senator Minority Leader Mitch McConnell outright condemned it. For Vice President Pence, whose safety was on the line that day, hasn't condemned it directly, but pretty clearly by implication. Mitt Romney has outright condemned it.
And they aren't alone.
In response, the RNC's spokesman McDaniel's has essentially said "that's not what we meant" and that the press is misconstruing what was said. In the process, she's condemned the January 6 rioters, which means in order to escape her statement she's moving away from Donald Trump, who has more or less said he'd pretty much pardon them all.
Quite a moment.
Was the statement misconstrued?
That's actually hard to say, based upon its text. You could read things into it to get that meaning. If you don't, it pretty much flat out indicates the rioters were engaged in "legitimate political discourse". As that's such a shocking proposition, it suggests that it was an example of being an extraordinarily tone-deaf text.
Having said that, there are undoubtedly some there who meant the very thing that McDaniels is now saying it didn't mean.
How could this happen?
Chris Christie, on This Week provided a pretty good explanation, although nobody dwelled on it. This isn't the opinion of the entire rank and file of the GOP, although in the current GOP, with its influx of formerly Democratic blue collar voters, and many who have accepted the Trump propaganda, and the ongoing abandonment of the party by its former mainstream members, well over half belief that the election was stolen. This is a tone-deaf statement by some 100 GOP members.
And, just based on observation, it's made up of the people who are really active in the party right now, and they're the most extreme members.
In the modern world, or at least the modern United States, people listen only to people just like themselves. They've self segregated themselves even in an era when traditional segregation has died away. People only listen to people who have the same political views. They check news channels that portray the world only the way that they want it portrayed. They don't read newspapers much. They only go to websites that hold the same views that they do.
And pretty soon, as everyone they view or talk to says the same things they think, they believe that must be the only way to see it.
It fuels fanaticism.
And in that atmosphere, saying something that could be read that way, if it wasn't meant, is easy to do, even without realizing that most people aren't going to read it that way.
McDaniels is busy trying to explain it away to the press. Too late. The damage is done. But most who did the damage won't ever realize that. They'll just accept McDaniels' claim that it's the press picking on the GOP. And to some degree, maybe it is, but if you hand your opponents a weapon to be used against you, it's your fault for doing that.
And so we find ourselves in a "teachable moment". Find the political points that make you uncomfortable. You might not change your views, but then again, you might.
If everyone you talk to is saying the same things you are, you're just listening to yourself.
