Capehart: Should We Start The Countdown Clock On When The Pipe Bomb Suspect Is Pardoned?
“New York Times” columnist David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart of MS NOW join Geoff Bennett to discuss the week in politics, including the Capitol Hill pipe bomb and conspiracy theories.
GEOFF BENNETT, PBS NEWSHOUR: What’s to be done about it? I mean, the suspect in the January 6 pipe bomber case reportedly said that he believed the conspiracy and the false claims that Trump didn’t win the election. There are clear consequences to this misinformation and these conspiracy theories. JONATHAN CAPEHART, MS NOW: Are there? We have just seen more than 1,000 people who participated in the riot of the Capitol on January 6, were held accountable in courts of law, only to be pardoned by the president of the United States. So, at this point, great. You found the bomber. Should we start the countdown clock on when that person gets pardoned? BENNETT: David? DAVID BROOKS, NEW YORK TIMES: I just think there should be more shame for conspiracy thinking. If you think January 6 was an inside job, if you think 9/11 was an inside job, you are spreading the kind of acidic disinformation that destroys all our institutions. And just to ride my hobbyhorse for a little bit, if you think the FBI and Joe Biden’s Justice Department were hiding some massive conspiracy about Jeffrey Epstein, you are defaming the men and women of the FBI and the DOJ. And it’s an attempt at dehumanization. And people spin these conspiracy theories, and so I’m just – questions are being asked. It’s all dishonorable inference. But it has clear corrosive effects on democracy that, if we can’t trust the institutions of our government, then we do not have a democracy. And conspiracy thinking is a kind of acidic kind of mental disease that undermines that. BENNETT: Indeed.
