better than we i think we can deal with a black woman in outer space who has sith powers. the question is that the threats are always going to be boycotted. but these are people that are not fans of the genre anyway. so, it s a boycott leading to what? and also and a boycott for what purpose? if you want to watch right-wing science fiction, you are perfectly happy to do that. star ship troopers s right wing. you have got things being made by then shapiro. if you have wet gina corona is doing now, you can do that. but for the rest of the planet that simply enjoys content, obi-wan kenobi, for all the people who said that they were going to boycott because they didn t like that african american women, who wasn t inquisitor and clearly the majority of the country and the world is happy with seeing science fiction reflect the world that we want, not the world that some people want to hold on to. you know why they don t want to watch the bench appear a one. it s not goo
vulcanized viewership is, given how hard it is to capture attention and focus it in one place, whether you can have something like what you saw in iran contra or watergate or the army mccarthy hearings. what do you think? i think it is a lot harder now. absolutely, it s harder. there is a media fragmentation. less people are watching national news than ever before. more people are getting their news from facebook and other places. it is tougher to get all of this, to see through. and that is a problem for our democracy. but i must say, would i think we need the january 6th committee hearing the committee to do is to tell us, frankly, where they already have. they may need new bomb shelves to bring in more viewers. but we ve seen over the last 17 months, the incredible evidence of a multi faceted criminal
party. george, it s good to have you on tonight. what do you think of this decision? as unsurprising as it may be? the calculation behind it and what it means? well, it is a simple calculation of economics and what they are selling to their viewers. i mean, fox news and sean hannity have both said that sean is not a journalist. and with this decision shows that fox news is not a news organization. news organizations broadcast hearings that are important to the life of the country, and important to the history of the country. that is why, as you point out, the army mccarthy hearings will broadcast. and the watergate hearings were broadcast. and it was during the iran contra hearings, those were broadcast. and the fox news channel broadcast the benghazi hearings. they were not that important. but they are refusing to broadcast this hearing, and these hearings involve, essentially, an attempt to overthrow democracy. that is more important than what mccarthy s red baiting red
6th story may be a little embarrassing for fox. their hosts are not just observers of the story. they were participants. they were begging and pleading for trump to stop the insurrection. they were mortified, just like everyone else, who was not storming the capital, or donald trump. but there is also a larger reason, of course, at play, where they may not want to come to the hearings. in modern american politics, in the last, i don t know, 70 years there are essentially two big comparisons for monumental, opinion shifting televised hearings. up first, there were the mccarthy army hearings. back in 1954, you probably know the contours of the story, but the specifics are interesting. republican senator joseph mccarthy of wisconsin, he was basically mad with power. right? he was this right wing demagogue. his high-profile investigations into alleged communists subversion of the u.s. government had made him this overnight star. and his position chairing the senate permanent subcommittee
downfall or his boss s downfall, firsthand, during the hearings, he was later serving as close confident and mentor to none other than donald trump. two decades after the mccarthy hearings, the nation turns its eyes to the live coverage, this time for that nixon watergate hearings. the three commercial networks aired them as they happen, first altogether, then in rotation. pbs reared them, unedited at night. listen to how pbs justified that decision at the time. we are running at all each day because we think the hearings are important. because we think it s important that you get a chance to see the whole thing and make your own judgments. some nights we may be in competition with a late, late movie. we are doing this as an experiment, temporarily abandoning our ability to edit, to give you the whole story. however, many hours it may take. it s a bold decision. one that a lot of the country, by some estimate, 80% of americans, to watch the watergate hearings unfold. in realtime.