Most of the time I think that some of the things that political scientists and smart journalists are teaching are getting through. And then, sometimes, we get something like this from an unnamed member of the committee of the House of Representatives that’s investigating the assault on the U.S. Capitol of Jan. 6, 2021. Speaking about the report the committee’s preparing, the lawmaker said, “There’s one-third of the nation that will read it, one-third that might read it, and one-third that won’t even believe it.”
So the committee thinks that its potential audience is two-thirds of the nation? A third of the nation wouldn’t read a 600-word statement from a newly emerged divinity explaining what the new era of peace and enlightenment was going to be like. Even if it was illustrated with … well, I’ll leave that to your imagination. There’s no way — no way — that anything like a third of the nation, let alone two out of three people, is going to read the Jan. 6 report.
This doesn’t mean the report is useless. For one thing, quite a few opinion leaders will familiarize themselves with the highlights, and some will actually read it, and what they learn from it will filter out to the public. Still, the public has two important defenses against absorbing new information. One is various degrees of inattentiveness; few people pay close attention to the news, and some hardly notice even major events. The other is partisanship. The committee’s findings are certain to reflect badly on former President Donald Trump, so partisan Democrats will be eager to accept and remember those findings, while partisan Republicans will resist them.
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