But again: as traumatic as January 6 may have been, when push comes to shove, it’s not what people are voting on. As CNN pointed out, Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring attempted to tie his opponent to the Capitol riot by linking him to the Republican Attorneys General Association, which helped fund and organize the Save America rally on the Ellipse before Trump supporters marched to the Capitol. Herring lost.

January 6 cannot be the Democrats’ primary campaign theme this year, and it cannot be a fallback option if the Democrats don’t pass any of Biden’s agenda, if the child tax credit permanently dies and student loans are resumed, and if the Biden administration doesn’t end the pandemic as we know it or at least get a better handle on it. If the Democrats want to put themselves in the best possible position to win the election and ensure whatever it is we have left of democracy survives for a few more years, they’re going to have to do it the old-fashioned way—talking to voters about the ways in which Democratic control has made and will continue to make their lives better. But before they talk about it, they have to have something to show.