Ahead of Thursday’s hearing of the House Jan. 6 committee, a CNN columnist actually acknowledged the truth: Voters are far more concerned about inflation and our cratering economy than the so-called “insurrection.”
It must have been painful for CNN’s headliner to write, “Voters may care more about the cost of French fries than January 6 panel’s compelling evidence.”
Citing the September consumer price index data released by the Labor Department on Thursday, which showed inflation had climbed 8.2 percent year-over-year, columnist Stephen Collinson was forced to admit the truth.
“Polls repeatedly show that voters see the economy — a far more visceral issue in daily life than the threat to American democracy — as their top concern,” he wrote.
“Their anxiety was explained by the latest inflation data. Grocery bills are just a pain right now. Frozen potato products are up 10%, pork products that are not sausages are 5.5% more expensive, according to US Producer Price Index data released on Wednesday.
“While it would be too simplistic to say voters are more preoccupied with the cost of French fries than the price of democratic freedoms, it wouldn’t be far from the mark.”
Aside from the fact that he chose products whose price increases came in at the lower end of the scale compared to things like energy, travel and even dairy products, this really was quite the admission.
The liberal scribe went even further.
Collinson informed readers, “New CNN/SSRS poll numbers published Thursday show that the economy and inflation are especially concerning to voters in competitive congressional districts. While 59% of registered voters nationwide call the economy extremely important to their vote, that rises to 67% in these districts. The share calling inflation that important rises from 56% to 64%.”
Is inflation a more important issue than Jan. 6?
He then made another remarkable confession: “It’s hard not to see Thursday’s January 6 hearing as an intervention in the midterms.”
Ya think? How could it be construed any other way?
This committee, comprised of seven rabid Democrats and the two House Republicans who hate former President Donald Trump the most, one of them obsessively so, chose to hold its hearing 26 days out from the midterms. Early voting is already underway in many states and will begin shortly in others. Of course it’s an intervention.
Still, Collinson seems genuinely surprised that voters are far more worried about the state of the economy and rising prices than they are about the Capitol incursion.
Psst: Most Americans don’t see the events of Jan. 6 as an “attack on our democracy.” Rather, they see it as Americans exercising their First Amendment right to protest the results of an election that appeared to them to be riddled with fraud. Certainly, events escalated to the point of rioting, which every Republican politician and pundit quickly acknowledged and condemned.
The focus on what Democrats labeled an “insurrection” instantly diverted attention from the reason for the protest. Allegations of election fraud were swept aside. Democrats immediately created a new narrative.
Suddenly, the election result was settled. And Trump and his supporters were “election deniers” and conspiracy theorists who had violently attempted to overturn the results of the “most secure election ever.”
None of that is true. According to the Constitution, changes in election law must be ratified by state legislatures. Ahead of the 2020 election, however, a number of secretaries of state in crucial battleground states bypassed the legislatures entirely and changed rules pertaining to signature requirements, ballot collection and more in the name of the pandemic.
While Democrats argue that fraud has never been proved, no court, including the Supreme Court, allowed any of the fraud cases to be heard. The failure of any court to hear these cases is not proof that fraud did not occur. On the contrary, it has merely left the question of whether the 2020 election was conducted fairly unanswered.
Collinson might be surprised to learn that most Republicans and likely many independents see the real assault on our democracy as coming from the Biden administration, whose ever-growing lust for power has eroded our God-given freedoms and threatens to destroy the greatest country in the world.
Only those who have bought into the Democrats’ “big lie” about Jan. 6 would find it hard to believe that inflation trumps a bogus, hyper-partisan witch hunt.
What many of us find surprising is that a CNN writer would admit it.
