It’s really a shame that the master propagandists of the mid-20th century in Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia missed the 21st-century revolution in imaging. Think what Goebbels and his Nazi cohorts could have done with modern CGI. Or what Stalin could have done with deep fakes.
Democrats on the Jan. 6 Committee are not similarly handicapped. They are beginning to prepare a multimedia presentation that will be available online when their final report is released (probably about six weeks out from the midterms).
And they plan to hire a writer as “part of its effort to turn its largely secretive work into a compelling narrative, multiple sources tell CNN.”
Question: Will there be scary background music to augment and enhance the “compelling narrative”?
“We don’t want it to read like a clunky committee effort,” Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin told CNN. “We want it to have an authorial voice that tells the story of what happened.”
The effort to hire a writer, confirmed to CNN by three sources familiar with the discussions, comes as the panel enters a new stage of its investigation. After collecting mountains of information, committee members must now determine how much of it to use in building its case to a public still inundated with images of rioting at the US Capitol but which may not understand the full extent of the efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
Will they differentiate between the legal efforts to challenge the electoral vote count and the illegal efforts to overturn the decision of the voters? Will they paint the peaceably assembled demonstrators who came to the Capitol ellipse to hear Donald Trump and other speakers as insurrectionists? Trying to lump the more than 50,000 Americans who came to listen to Trump in with a couple of hundred rioters who broke into the Capitol is false, misleading propaganda.
One thing that’s certain about this production: it will only tell one side of the story. And the evidence and images will be manipulated with no “minority report” to push back on it.
Describing the type of candidate to take on the writing job, another source familiar with the decision said “the person who writes a press release isn’t necessarily the person that’s going to write the deep dive, and making sure that they can put the time and energy into it, was something that we talked about.”
The source added that Mississippi Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson, who chairs the panel, first raised the idea of hiring an outside writer as early as November, and that it has remained an active conversation since.
“The last we left it was it’s something that we’re seeking, but we also have someone in house who’s taking on an expanded role to help,” the source said.
The reason that was given for all the propaganda razzmatazz with a “compelling narrative” and exciting imagery is that this is the way that most people people “consume information.”
Presenting its information in a comprehensive and engaging way will be crucial to creating a convincing argument for potential legislative changes as well as possible criminal referrals.
It’s also a recognition of how most people consume information in 2022 — and the massive amount of video evidence the committee has at its disposal.
In other words, people are too dumb to read words. The words must be accompanied by images. The Committee won’t want journalists for this work. This is a job for a Hollywood screenwriter.
The ability to show a “comprehensive” story in an “engaging way” is what Hollywood writers have been doing for 100 years. Oliver Stone would be an excellent choice, given he’s already written one nutty conspiracy film, JFK, and he’s a radical lefty to boot.
But I think Ron Howard is the Committee’s man to write this blockbuster. Cocoon meets Apollo 13? Can’t wait for the opening.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member