In the days after January 6, 2020, I had a conversation with a friend of mine about it. I said I was angry. She said she was angry too. We talked some more, and after a while, I started to realize that she and I were not angry about the same things.

She said that the people who stormed the Capital building, assaulted and killed police officers, and destroyed property were Black Lives Matter and Antifa people pretending to be Trump Republicans. I asked her why she thought this. Her proof for this was a photograph showing a protester inside the Capital building raising a fist, which she said was a Black Lives Matter salute.

There’s a photograph of Missouri Republican Senator Josh Hawley raising his fist in support of the insurrection. He is actually using that photograph in merchandise that he’s selling. So, maybe a fist pump doesn’t actually indicate that you’re a member of Black Lives Matter.

In any case, this story, that Antifa and BLM took part in the January 6 insurrection, was very popular at the time. President Trump repeated the story, and Fox News personalities repeated it too. I have no doubt that it was running through the other “media” on YouTube and Facebook.

But since then, hundreds of people who stormed the Capital building have been identified and arrested. Not a single one of them is associated with Antifa or Black Lives Matter. These really were all Trump Republicans, intent on overthrowing the government and installing their preferred dictator in spite of how the American people voted. If even one of these people had been associated with BLM or Antifa, Fox News would never let us hear the end of it. But this has not happened.

Donald Trump, Fox News, and the other media told a flat-out lie, and my friend believed it. I pointed this out to her later, and all of a sudden, she didn’t know anything about politics. I find that this is typical of Republicans: once you pin them down, all of a sudden they don’t want to talk about politics anymore.

Did Fox News ever print a retraction? Did Tucker Carlson ever say, “I was wrong”? (Here’s a clue: if your preferred source of news and information never issues a correction, they’re most likely lying to you.)

We have evidence. Donald Trump lied to us. Fox News lied to us. They made up a lie on the spot and they got caught.

Since that time, the Republican party has admitted that the people who tried to overthrow the government on January 6th were Trump Republicans. However, now they’re telling a different lie. The Republican National Committee called the insurrection “legitimate political discourse.” They act like it was not a big deal, like no one should be angry about it. But it’s not usual for “legitimate political discourse” to force Congress to stop its business and go into hiding. It’s not usual for Republican congressional representatives text and phone the president pleading with him to call of a mob that he instigated. Republicans are lying to us again.

Why do people vote for them?