Crash Course: Jan. 6 House Committee hearings start today

[View this email in your browser]( Your daily update from [Salon](. Here's what the Democrats could do with the Jan. 6 committee The House Select Committee investigating the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol riot convenes this morning. Officers from the Capitol Police and D.C.'s Metropolitan Police Department are scheduled to testify about the abuse they faced while protecting the Capitol. Democrats have "the opportunity of a lifetime" in these hearings, [says Salon columnist Lucian K. Truscott IV]( but they could blow that opportunity by making three big mistakes. "If they fail to put up videos of the violence at the Capitol on Jan. 6, if they fail to announce that hearings of the committee will resume immediately following the August recess and will continue until the committee has completed its work, and if they turn Republican Liz Cheney into a rock star." Cheney, who will give one set of opening remarks Tuesday, is one of two Republicans on the bipartisan committee, which she [defied House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy]( to join. [Speaker Nancy Pelosi also appointed Rep. Adam Kinzinger]( R-Ill., after rejecting two of McCarthy's picks — Jims Jordan (R-Ohio) and Banks (R-Ind.), both of whom objected to certifying election results after the riot and whose selection for the job [Pelosi called "ridiculous]( McCarthy then pulled his other three nominees in retaliation. (Both Cheney and Kinzinger voted in favor of the impeachment of Donald Trump for incitement, two of only 10 House Republicans to do so.) Truscott suggests Democrats roll up their sleeves and look to the infamous Hillary Clinton-Benghazi hearings for a blueprint on how to make the most, politically, of the hearings. [Read his analysis]( and tune in to [watch the testimony live]( on C-SPAN.org, starting at 9:30 a.m. Sorry, Jeff Bezos. You're not an astronaut Last week, Amazon founder and executive chairman Jeff Bezos completed his first suborbital flight on his own spacecraft made by his company Blue Origin. Coverage of the spaceflight, including in the Bezos-owned Washington Post, referred to him and the other rocket passengers as "astronauts." The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) disagrees. Is it a coincidence that the FAA implemented a new policy on July 20 — the same day Bezos blasted into space — specifying qualifications for its Commercial Space Astronaut Wings Program that Bezos didn't meet? Who's to say? The FAA's requirements matter — to billionaires paying their own way into space who then call themselves "astronauts," at least — because it's the only agency that confers "astronaut" designation to non-employees. (NASA and the U.S. military have stricter protocols.) Here's why [Bezos' space cowboy trip didn't qualify](. - A former Republican calls this "the most dangerous moment in this nation's history." [We can't afford to look away](. - Does Eric Trump’s recent silence suggest [that he is in legal trouble]( - Subway's tuna scandal is just the tip of the iceberg — [fish fraud is everywhere](. - Biden's reflex has been to gladhand his way across the aisle. Is he sliding [back toward "compromise" with Republicans]( - Does your cat really love you? [Here's what science says]( - Conservatives want Kevin McCarthy to [punish "Pelosi Republicans]( for joining January 6 probe. - The progressive media nonprofit FAIR was lucky. "We also figured out [how to shame journalists into doing better]( - Elliott Page is bringing [greater transmasculine visibility to the media](. It's refreshing, but not without drawbacks - What's growing in Ina Garten's garden? [The Barefoot Contessa invites you over]( Get ready for déjà vu: Republican strategy in 2022 will be to relitigate 2020 Donald Trump is not distancing himself from the insurrection, [Heather "Digby" Parton writes]( as his performance at his rally on Saturday showed. Billed as an event about "election integrity" — read: the Big Lie about 2020 — Trump hammered home his message on the so-called "fraud," reinforcing his determination to organize the party around his lost cause, even as many Republican leaders have tried to bury meaningful investigation of that day. "[T]he last thing Republicans want to be talking about in that campaign is the trainwreck of January 6th. But even if they had been able to derail a congressional investigation, they can't shut up Donald Trump, and he can talk of nothing else — and the Republican establishment is increasingly worried about it." * * * GOP politics has become a Biggest Troll contest "Hillbilly Elegy" author and venture capitalist J.D. Vance is running for Senate in Ohio, [Amanda Marcotte writes]( and in a Republican primary in Trump-leaning Ohio, that means he has to embrace trolling — tweeting more and more outlandish statements in hopes of triggering the libs — as a strategy. His new attention-grab? Arguing that childless adults shouldn't get to vote because they have "no physical commitment to the future of this country." "He targeted Vice President Kamala Harris, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, and transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg as people who, because they are childless, should be blocked from the franchise. Notably, three of the four are people of color and one is gay, underscoring how much this gambit is about appealing bluntly to the MAGA belief that only people that are like them deserve to have a say in government." - "[The Post-Dirtbag Left]( The New Yorker - "[The absurd coverage of the January 6 committee]( Columbia Journalism Review - "[I’m a Parkland Shooting Survivor. QAnon Convinced My Dad It Was All a Hoax]( Vice - "[The Incalculable Cost of Cheap Chicken—and the Hidden Industry That Shoulders It]( Type Investigations - "[How an 18th-Century Cookbook Offers Glimpses of Jane Austen's Domestic Life]( LitHub USA Fencing goes to great lengths to let an Olympic alternate accused of sexual misconduct compete in Tokyo Team USA fencing alternate Alen Hadzic is under investigation for at least three accusations of sexual misconduct reported to the U.S. Center for SafeSport[,]( a nonprofit agency tasked with protecting athletes from abuse. These investigations of Hadzic were brought to the attention of the International Olympic Committee back in May, when six women fencers — including two Olympic athletes — wrote a letter describing Hadzic's selection as a "direct affront" to those accusing him, which they said could put fellow athletes at risk. More allegations have since come to light in reporting by Buzzfeed News. Rather than bar Hadzic from the Olympics while these allegations are investigated, USA Fencing created a "safety plan" which put him on a separate flight to Tokyo from other Olympic athletes and is housing him a separate hotel from the Olympic Village. Hadzic is also prohibited from practicing with female fencers, yet Hadzic's attorney Michael Palma has complained that the plan does not allow Hadzic to "participate in the Olympic experience that he has rightfully earned." [There's more](. (Photo by Devin Manky/Getty Images) Have a tip for Salon? Feedback on this newsletter? 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