As it was becoming clear last week that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell would have to return to the secrecy of his Capitol Hill suite and tweak or rewrite his health care bill, thousands of supporters of the Affordable Care Act were marching outside, joined by Democratic senators and congressmen.

McConnell’s troubles, and the coinciding protests, fit together neatly. They told the story of a Republican Party knocked back on its heels by a popular backlash to the odious and unpopular policies they were trying to foist on the public. With the exception, perhaps, of the House GOP’s early stumble—when Speaker Paul Ryan had to pull his version of Trumpcare from the floor before a vote—this was the high-water mark for the Trump opposition. It proved that under a consistent spotlight, legislation as cruel and corruptly conceived as the Republican health care bills would have a very hard time becoming law.

And yet, the next turn in the story was eminently predictable.

“I’m nervous that the TV networks don’t think that this gets eyeballs like Russia does and some of these other issues,” Connecticut Senator Chris Murphy told the hosts of the liberal podcast Pod Save America. “And so we are going to have to create news. We are going to have to build crowds like this in every state to make sure that TV cameras have to turn out.”

Murphy was echoing his concern for what I described last week as the media’s bias toward “new” news—and the corollary tendency to give short shrift to live issues that haven’t changed much. McConnell’s secret bill writing process exploited that bias, but eventually GOP health care reform had to become news.