This is an amazing essay. Too many Medium political writers are so quick to degrade Mr. Trump and his supporters but don't want to understand how the USA got to this position where it would elect someone like him. And even with the inevitable Biden victory, that trump demographic is going to be a significant political force for a couple of decades at least.
While it should be nuetered, the question is how? Trying to defang the profit-motives of the various media is only going to raise a whole bunch of "freedom of the press" issues.
To digress a bit, Medium contributor Allen Milne Lees has proposed an interesting solution. His contention is that 85% of the population is intellectually incapable of analyzing the forces that shape society--and thus cannot vote wisely. The political parties cater to that unwise vote, leading to the politicians like Mr. Trump.
Mr. Lees proposes a system of direct democracy where the wise 15% decide things. My question to him is: "Who decides who belongs to the 15%?" He has no answer.
In a like manner, who decides whether Facebook or Foxx news is inside the boundaries of good political discourse or not? What are the rules? Who are the enforcers? If we think some people are superior to others for this task, then it's not hard to see this democracy turning into a one-party state.
In 1997, I started writing about a different kind of democracy: one without political parties and their noisy election campaigns. Elections are annual and everyone gets to vote. But what voters vote for is much different than what they vote for today.
You might be interested in Tiered Democratic Governance
