Watergate Hearings Shaped Politics for a Generation – These Hearings are Even More Important
The House Select Committee examining the events of and leading up to the January 6 attempt to overthrow the government begins public hearings today. This after over 1,000 interviews and 140,000 documents reviewed.
They seem clearly focused on the importance of ensuring the public gets a complete and coherent presentation of what happened and who is responsible. Time will tell, but it seems they have done good work and know what needs to be done. The rest is up to us.
I know everyone is tired of conflict and politics. Suck it up. This is as important as it gets and the more Americans who take this in, the better.
Hearings start at 8 PM tonight. Pretty much every network and most local stations, and CSPAN are covering it. Most will have pre-hearings coverage for at least an hour prior to the gavel falling and many will offer post hearing analysis.
Only Fox is not covering these hearings at all, which further confirms what a worthless, destructive organization that is and is likely to always be.
Still hesitant to watch it? At least do the first round tonight and judge from there. Here are links to two excellent articles on what to expect and why this deserves our attention:
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/june-8-2022?s=r
Bill Clontz
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Let’s grow our circle.
Missed the first part of Rep.Thompson but was really impressed with Liz Cheney’s integrity. The filmmaker’s surprise at the atmospheric change just confirms how alien the coup idea is to most Americans. And Officer Edwards saying it was a war zone. Trump is so envious of Putin’s power but thank God “President-for-life” is not what true Americans believe in.
It was a powerful night. Will be interesting to see how the remaining sessions go.
I thought that Rep. Thompson set the stage very well, Liz Cheney was very courageous and right on target and showed impressive courage. Caroline Edwards was not only an exemplary police office on January 6th, but also showed great courage in testifying before the committee. The never before seen video was also an eye opener.
I agree. I don’t think they could have had a better opening session. I have the rest of them on my calendar.
Many years ago my boss/mentor told me that the requisite qualities in a political leader are the refusal to speak or listen to nonsense…and conversely, the willingness to always seek out and speak the truth. Too many leaders today reject this wisdom. They listen only to nonsensical fabrications and speak only poll-tested words and phrases. This is exemplified by the refusal of America’s political right to watch and listen to the hearings. Their minds are so infected by their lust for power that they have lost the ability to discern or care about facts and truth. It is a sad day in America. But, I do believe that “We shall overcome…some day.”
Bill cannot possibly overstate the importance of the message from the House committee. I was very disappointed that PBS-NC chose not to carry Thursday night’s prime time broadcast on its primary TV channel, but instead opted to pipe it out through YouTube. I write them a nastygram on this issue and they replied (quite promptly), “We have heard from many viewers who felt that it should have been broadcast on our main channel and will consider this in the future.”
I am further dismayed that the only live broadcast I could find for Monday morning’s broadcast is on C-SPAN. None of the major networks, including PBS, and certainly not Fox News are airing it.
Nonetheless, I sincerely hope that committee’s message over the next few weeks will be powerful enough and audience of even slightly open-minded conservatives large enough that we will see sufficient Republican rejection in November for the Democrats to retain control of Congress. If not, Mitch McConnell will have achieved his objective of paralyzing Congress until the next Presidential election, a colossal disservice to the nation.
Had not noted the local OBS failure. Good catch- thanks for calling them out.
We may find the network coverage better than you anticipate. The listings don’t always match up on these things. Che knit at 10 AM tomorrow and see who is up besides. CSPAN, YouTube, and MSNBC.