Welcome to the Making Sense podcast.

This is Sam Harris.

Okay, the siege of the capital.

I can't say I was expecting that exactly, but I can't say I was surprised either.

And nothing will surprise you about my view of Trump's responsibility here.

I think I need hardly express it.

But like so much that has happened under Trump, what occurred at the capital was in every

way unsurprising, but it was also in every way astonishing.

Trump has managed to invent a new state of the human brain.

Trump has turned our democracy and this period in American history into Pizzagate.

That was a Pizzagate insurrection.

We had people visibly and audibly deranged by misinformation.

I mean, just listen to what they say when you stick a microphone in front of their faces.

These are people who have been unhinged by the lies that have spilled ceaselessly from

the mouth of this president for years.

In a way, it was absolutely perfect.

It had none of the gravitas of a real coup, but it fully degraded our country.

I mean, in some sense, it was more debasing than a real coup attempt.

What we saw on DC was like a YouTube comment thread come to life.

Now we may find out much more about what happened here and it may even be more sinister than

it appeared.

I don't know.

...