Six months ago, when the first anniversary of Jan. 6 rolled around, CBS News commissioned a poll from YouGov asking Americans how they characterized the events of that day. As one would expect from such sponsors, most of the available choices were tendentious: “an insurrection,” “an attempt to overthrow the government,” “trying to overturn the election,” and so on.
But much to the pollsters’ and sponsor’s apparent dismay, the most common response from the 2,000 polled was that Jan. 6 was “a protest that went too far.”
This sensible result—shared by 76 percent of respondents, including 80 percent of Republicans, 69 percent of Democrats, and 80 percent of independents—was naturally buried. It didn’t fit the Narrative.
“There is only one acceptable—no, required—way to think about Jan. 6.”