The easy story is that January was an aberration. One bad month, one bad man, and now it’s behind us. The hard truth is that the conditions that made it possible are still here: politicians who thrive on lies, media that profits from outrage, and a public too easily seduced by spectacle.
We like to imagine democracy as self-correcting. It isn’t. It only works if people insist on accountability. And right now, there’s little sign we have the stomach for it. January 6th wasn’t the end of something. It was the start of a long reckoning.