Tucker Carlson and the January 6 Narrative War

By Steven Yates

March 21, 2023

“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” —George Orwell, 1984

One could see it coming.

Back in February, new House Speaker Kevin McCarthy gave popular Fox News host Tucker Carlson exclusive access to around 44,000 hours of previously unreleased footage of January 6, 2021. McCarthy spoke of “transparency.”

Starting on March 6, a Monday, Carlson began showing relevant portions of this footage on his show, and commenting on them. This has led to the latest explosion in hysterics from the narrative control freaks in both Congress and corporate media.

Carlson presented reasons for doubting the verisimilitude of the official narrative of January 6: that it was a “riot,” a “violent insurrection against democracy” that “killed six people.” Moreover, there may be reasons for believing some of this footage is exculpatory, and that some of the more visible Jan6ers (Jacob Chansley being the most obvious) are owed new trials in the interests of justice.

What we see from viewing the footage:

There were hooligans present who broke windows, but the majority of Jan-6ers were nonviolent. They entered the Capitol through open doors, and were just walking around, taking selfies, etc. Carlson called them “sightseers.”
Chansley, the so-called “QAnon Shaman,” looks outrageous with his face paint, fur hat and horns, but does not assault anyone. Nearly every moment he spent in the Capitol is on video somewhere; Carlson’s footage shows him with police seeming to escort him around. Neither is acting as if the other is a threat. Chansley, arrested three days later, plea-bargained his way to a 41-month prison sentence, even though he was unarmed and there are no indications he committed a real crime. Entering the Capitol may have been ill-advised under the circumstances — no one denies this — but it’s a public building and merely entering a public building is not a crime. Admittedly he looks like a nut. But neither is this a crime. Nor is believing in the QAnon “conspiracy theory” a criminal offense (yet!). The man has officially diagnosed mental health issues. As I write, he is locked up, clearly a political prisoner, where his problems are likely to worsen from isolation and neglect.
Officer Brian Sicknick is clearly visible in a different segment, walking around after Trump supporters are supposed to have beaten him over the head with a fire extinguisher. In fairness, corporate media outlets like The New York Times who originally ran with this story retracted it some time ago. We still encounter versions of it, however, as part of the general claim that “six people died that day.” But the fact remains: not a single death on the Capitol grounds can be attributed to violent actions by Trump supporters. But two deaths that did occur can be attributed to acts of deadly violence by Capitol Police.
Carlson interviews former Officer Tarik Johnson, who alleges that he was left on his own, receiving no guidance whatsoever from superiors who were clearly caught completely unprepared for the sheer numbers. There seems to have been no security plan in place. Johnson describes how he donned one of the infamous MAGA hats to negotiate his way through the crowd more easily. That one act cost him his job.

The Jan-6ers — with tens of thousands of people in the Capitol’s general vicinity — were there because they believed the election had been stolen. They believed they were protecting democracy, not trying to overturn democracy.

The official narrative accuses them of trying to stage a “coup against democracy” led by a sitting president who had lost a “free and fair election.” Many have stated that they were encouraged to march to the Capitol after listening to Trump’s infamous speech at the Ellipse, near the White House. Corporate media outlets reported Trump’s call to his supporters to march to the Capitol, dishonestly editing out one of the most important phrases he used, that they should “peacefully and patriotically make their voices heard.” Trump was impeached based on the coup-against-democracy narrative.

Must I repeat: nowhere does Trump say enter the Capitol. Ray Epps was filmed doing that. Epps vehemently denies having been an FBI informant. The FBI also denies it. The fact remains: Epps (who also in fairness did not enter the Capitol himself) was not charged with anything. He was considered one of the “good guys.” Just what is his story? Why was he encouraging others to go in when Trump hadn’t? These questions have gone begging.

Trump’s supporters believed the real coup against democracy had taken place on November 3-4, 2020, reflected in those mysterious early morning vote spikes, all representing votes for Biden, recorded on graphs that were scrubbed from the Internet days later, also in dozens of claims of eye-witnessed malfeasance, reported on affidavits signed under a penalty of perjury.

All memory-holed, in Orwellian fashion, so that judges and even Trump’s attorney general William Barr could say “there’s no evidence of fraud” and corporate media outlets could brand stolen-election claims as “lies” (not mere falsehoods but lies — a purposefully stronger claim).

The reactions to the Carlson broadcasts are similarly telling. From Chuck Schumer: “To say January 6 was not violent, is a lie, a lie, pure and simple.” Did he watch Carlson’s broadcast? Carlson had not said there was no violence, only that the reports of it were greatly exaggerated for political reasons. Schumer went on to state that Carlson’s letting the public see any of that footage was a “threat to democracy.”

From Mitt Romney, who can always be guaranteed to parrot the Establishment line: “It’s really sad to see Tucker Carlson go off the rails that bad…. The American people saw what happened on Jan. 6. They’ve seen the people that got injured. They saw the damage to the building. You can’t hide the truth by selectively picking a few minutes out of tapes and saying this is what went on. It’s so absurd. It’s nonsense.”

The answer is that of course Carlson selected from the footage. He had 44,000 hours of it, most of which was doubtless useless images of empty hallways and closed doors. He used what was relevant. As to what the American people saw of what happened that day, those who were not there — or not watching online from multiple perspectives (as I was, with three devices set up in my home office) — “saw,” after the fact, what corporate media wanted them to see.

From the Bidenista White House: following up those others, a mere, “Tucker Carlson is not credible.”

From corporate media: CNN’s Anderson Cooper proves himself to be a fundamentally disgusting human being, saying: “The idea of Tucker Carlson being in that mob that day and not wetting his pants is hard to imagine.”

Stephen Colbert, who “make[s] a good living” thinking he is funny and not merely obnoxious, is worse. “Some people,” his rant concludes, “are just addicted to being d*cks.” Since he brings it up, it was apparently okay for Dominion Voting Systems to cherrypick a handful of quotes out of tens of thousands of internal emails and messages, not supplying context, to portray Carlson and others at Fox of gaslighting their audience, saying on the air they believed the election was stolen when they really didn’t believe this. But it is definitely not okay for Carlson to rely on an hour or so out of 44,000 hours to portray the majority of Jan-6ers as nonviolent.

Jimmy Kimmel, finally, did what he does best: wax sarcastic. At the Academy Awards this past Sunday he stated, “Editors do amazing things…. Editors can turn 44,000 hours of violent insurrection footage into a respectful sight-seeing tour of the Capitol.”

These are representative, and support the idea that an Establishment, which ranges across the Asylum on the Potomac, corporate media, and the highly controlled entertainment industry, is fighting for a narrative.

Watch Carlson’s footage here, noting the contrast between the narrative corporate media has been feeding us for over two years now, and what had not been released before last week. Which the January 6 Committee had, but did not show publicly.

Carlson follows up here and responds to his critics here.

Upshot: to say that Americans have a situation on their hands doesn’t even begin to cover it. Tens of millions of Republicans (and at least some Independents) continue to believe something about Election 2020 wasn’t above board, and that there had been a concerted, behind-the-scenes effort to get Trump out of office by whatever means necessary. Time Magazine as much as admitted that such an effort existed, establishing the narrative that Trump would try to steal the election unless preventions were in place. They evidently were: who would have thought that tech billionaires would have joined forces with hard-leftists???

Recall that tens of thousands came to Washington, D.C. on January 6. Not a single building was set ablaze, or car overturned. This followed the George Floyd riots of mid-2020, which no one can honestly deny were extremely violent and destructive, doing hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of damage in multiple cities across the country.

But since these were cultural leftists, depicted by a left-friendly corporate media as “social justice protesters,” they not only got a pass, but were respected, honored even. Those who found themselves in situations where they believed they were in possible ndanger and reacted accordingly were the ones prosecuted/persecuted, their lives derailed. Ask the McCloskeys!

Such cases should tell us all we need to know about whose narratives have cultural power in America. Cultural power is not political power, but it does give groups the capacity to get violent with some assurance that they won’t be held accountable, and that even if they are arrested and charged, their cases will be favorably portrayed because their actions fit the “social justice” narrative.

In other words, the real Big Lie is that a bunch of unarmed protesters who entered a public building were either capable of, or had any plans to, “overturn democracy.”

Carlson: In free countries governments do not lie about protests as a pretext to gain more power for themselves. They don’t selectively edit videos for propaganda services, and then lie about them to hold fake hearings and show trials. That’s exactly what happened, and every member of Congress should ask why that happened.

The U.S. is not a free country, of course. It is getting less free all the time. The U.S. is not a “democracy.” Nor is it a “republic” except on paper. Like all other Western industrial powers, the U.S. is a plutocratic oligarchy. It is run by a handful of immensely wealthy families in banks and other corporations who have the political class and “legacy” (corporate) media bought and paid for so that their interests are served. Would-be elected officials who refuse to serve this oligarchy end up moneyless and find themselves deemed “unelectable” when they are covered by media at all. The only way Trump got through was because he had billions of dollars of his own money to spend on his 2015-16 campaign.

Those who began on the inside of corporate media but eventually started dragging their feet at the cultural-leftward (or pro-war) drift were eventually elbowed out and now subsist on Substack.

Whether anyone likes it or not, Donald J. Trump remains the frontrunner for the GOP nomination in 2024. Ron DeSantis’s presumed “challenge” to him is yet another corporate media concoction, as he has yet to state his intentions.

The mere possibility that Trump could regain the White House terrifies the Establishment.

My guess, as of right now, is that he won’t be allowed back in office — anymore than he was allowed to win reelection. How will this be accomplished? Will we see another Election 2020? Or will we see Soros-bankrolled riots aimed at preventing Trump supporters from gathering peacefully? We saw this back in 2016, if anyone remembers, so it’s almost a given, that if a new Trump campaign begins to get legs, it will face violent opposition.

This is just one of the narrative wars in, or involving, American right now. I’ve not mentioned those things globalists indirectly benefit from because they distract, such as the fight over so-called transgenders and their “pronouns.” All I can say is that I went all the way through school, well over a decade total, getting a bachelors and eventually three advanced degrees, without ever once hearing the word, or one similar to it (transsexual).

All of a sudden these people seem to be everywhere, and their numbers seem to include children!

Who puts the idea in a child’s head that he/she can, or should, have a sex change operation? Or that he/she is “nonbinary” (another category that did not exist when I was a student).

To his credit, DeSantis has vigorously opposed all this nonsense, and should he announce his intent to run for the GOP nomination next year, in today’s environment his actions in Florida will be used vigorously by cultural leftists to denounce him.

Not to mention his just having called the Russia-Ukraine war a “territorial dispute” and “not a vital national interest” of the U.S. Ukraine, despite its being one of the most corrupt countries in the world, continues to be a protected state by said Establishment whose shills speak of the “rules-based international order” (i.e., rule by corporate globalists).

All these narrative wars are coming to a head little by little, and I’ve a sense that as bad as 2023 might turn out to be, in 2024 things could really get ugly! That’s if the Establishment doesn’t get us into the most destructive war in human history first!

E-Mail Steven Yates: freeyourmindinsc@yahoo.com

_________________

I wish to thank Thomas Abshier for becoming a $20/mo. Patron!

The first issue of the newsletter is out! The title has been changed to Truth, Freedom, Validation. It will offer content ranging across philosophy-for-living (as opposed to the idle academic discipline), survival strategies given the challenges to come, life and relationship advice, and more, with links to further content worth exploring and notes on recent important books in all these areas. There are (believe it or not!) good things happening! You can access Truth, Freedom, Validation Issue #1 here. Subsequent issues will be available to Patrons. To get the next issue, go here and sign up. (You can obtain it for just $1/month!)

ANNOUNCING: an online course/tutorial entitled The Philosophy of Responsible Freedom, directed by Jack C. Carney with myself as chief partner: a Zoom-based intellectual encounter between an atheist (Carney) and a Christian (Yates) exploring the history of ideas using Academy of Ideas videos and supplementing them with the thoughts of others. Carney is an autodidact in areas ranging across psychology, psychiatry, and anthropology who emphasizes the importance of human relationships in a world where loss is omnipresent (he also teaches English online). I am an author and trained philosopher with a doctorate in the subject who taught philosophy courses in years past, walked away from academia, still writes philosophy emphasizing the need to identify, clarify, and evaluate the success (or failure) of worldviews in civilization, stages of civilization, the quest to build free societies, and how worldviews either enhance or hobble responsible freedom. Course/tutorial outline here. For more information or to get on our email list: freeyourmindinsc@yahoo.com.

Steven Yates’s latest book What Should Philosophy Do? A Theory (2021) is available here and here. His earlier Four Cardinal Errors: Reasons for the Decline of the American Republic (2011) is available here.

While admittedly the real world can be scary enough, he has also written a novel of cosmic horror. The Shadow Over Sarnath will be published later this year.