Well, I can't deny that our media, particularly television, fails to keep the American public informed and engaged in a meaningful way. I also would have to agree that if you are watching this process from the outside then, yes, sadly we probably look like a bunch of idiots here.

I did read your post in the Republican Suicide thread where you asked why we can't seem to address the list of items you posted. I think your post here also plays into that same idea...basically that if it is easy to identify things that are destroying our political system why do we seem incapable of changing them and why do we appear so lost and confused as a country.

I think I can sort of explain this by pointing to a few key issues and I will attempt to be brief.

1. Reactionary Media and Reactionary Public

What I mean by this is that we have reached a state as a society where the reaction to the event is now more meaningful and longer lasting and in many ways more important than the event itself. If you were to play a drinking game where you took a drink every time they said "reaction" on a news show you would be drunk in 10 minutes. The internet is now tied in with television and so "your reaction" is as much a part of the story as whatever triggered the story. So, having 200 pundits on 50 different channels give their "reaction" to a political "moment" (be that a speech, rally, statement of support for a policy...whatever) so that you (meaning anybody) can then weigh in by texting or emailing your "reaction" to their "reaction" pretty much makes whatever the impetus of the story was of far less import than everybody ranting at each other afterwards about how they feel about it.

What this does is make for a media that is constantly searching not for stories that are important or that we need to know about but rather for stories that are more likely to generate widespread reaction. Reaction from pundits on their shows and then in turn reaction from the public. I recall after one of the recent Democratic debates following the debate and for the next few days the story was not about anything either of the candidates had said or which may have made a better case for being the more beneficial candidate for the country but rather the entire story of the debate was about had Bernie Sanders been rude to Hillary Clinton because he interrupted her at one point.

Obviously this is something that was meaningless and had no significance to anybody anywhere...and yet you could probably search the internet and find in some dark corner a conversation about this still going on and people vehemently giving their thoughts on it. People are willing to and feel comfortable giving their thoughts and opinions on somebody being "rude" and so the media got days out of this. Virtually nothing of what the candidates discussed was evaluated.

This is why a guy like Trump is the perfect candidate for our times because he understands this and EVERYTHING he says is designed to get a reaction...the media loves "reaction" and so he immediately became a favorite candidate for them because everybody, their pundits, reporters, and viewers are constantly prodded by the Donald into giving their REACTION.

In a world where people gauge the value of something through "likes" and "twitter blowing up" the guy that generates the most "reaction" wins...and it does not matter how he does it.

So, instead of any sort of thoughtful evaluation of anything, particularly the political process, we just get loads of "reaction" from the media...and not just the people they are paying to be on their shows, once all 8 of the guests have chimed in they go to the "Twitter feed" or Facebook, or the reaction we are texting to "Allow me to bloviate [email protected]"

The event only last seconds but they can do days upon days of reaction to the event. Now, I am not really saying that this "dumbs down" the public and it does give a sort of false sense that they are engaged but I think what really happens is whatever may have been meaningful and whatever we should have taken out of the event or moment...well...it gets completely lost in the hours and hours of "reaction."

We get more wrapped up in "What does this person or that person think?" than how was that meaningful to our lives. The internet has of course added to this because whatever story you go to read has a comments section where everybody has a chance to tell us what they think and then of course share it on facebook and twitter.

This means opinions are now as meaningful as facts...or at least they are now given the same weight in the media marketplace...or really opinions are now more valuable to the media than the facts because there tends to be more reaction to be had from an opinion.

2. Motivation through Fear and Anger

This is nothing new but for the most part beginning during the election process after Bill Clinton's second term there has been an intensification of the process of motivating particularly Republican/Conservative voters through fear and anger. As part of this a tremendous effort has been put forth by both parties, Democrats and Republicans, to build a violent mistrust of people that do not align with your political views. Our country was not divided along these lines to this degree only a short time ago. If you went back to the 1970s or even early 1980s there was not this boiling hatred of people who were a member of an opposing political party. Now if there was a Clinton rally in a hall adjoining a Trump rally as people spilled out into the street you could...quite possibly...have a riot on your hands.

A lot of this mistrust has been built up by blatantly misinforming voters who now have to sift through a web of lies and half truths to attempt to discern what the actual truth might be. In this election the years of attempting to anger voters and instigate mistrust, paranoia and fear has finally turned on the Republicans and they now have a segment of their "base" that now not only does not trust the Democrats and the media...they also don't trust the Republicans anymore either.

And really...the last thing the Republicans needed was further erosion of support for their party.

It is no accident that the expansion of cable television to many many more channels including several 24/7/365 news/talk channels and an abundance of radio talk shows that focused on political topics with the intent to incite less than inform occurred in this same time frame. So we now have this beast to feed that is trying to fill every minute of every day with news and reaction. There is only so much news but there is as I said above...never ending reaction.

3. Democracy is a system that is easy to corrupt.

We now have a political system that serves the few rather than the many. You asked before about a list of campaign reforms that probably from the outside appear ridiculously obvious. Why is it so difficult to change these things? Well, I would say first because the system is sort of rigged in that now that there are a few that have learned how to make it work in their favor they are not too interested in changing it and they can easily hide behind "our founding fathers" and call you Un-American if you suggest such a thing. The thing is this is exactly the kind of tyranny our founding fathers would have worked to prevent and change. So, I can say they would not be sitting on their thumbs taking this nonsense.

The problem is a Democracy is built on trust and goodwill and these are not things you can take for granted. When Franklin Roosevelt introduced the Revenue Act of 1935 which had the capacity through the Wealth Tax to take up to 75% of the annual income of the countries wealthiest individuals it actually would have only at that time effected a handful of people...and even taking 75% of their annual income would have left them still the wealthiest people in the country. This was not done to "punish the rich" or because Roosevelt was a communist...it was done to prevent greed from destroying our democracy. We were still a nation that allowed for enormous success and enormous wealth through achievement but those who benefited the most were asked to give back the most with the idea that the success of many would benefit us all. The country needed the funds and so they increased the taxes on the incredibly wealthy.

However, you could never get the Revenue Act of 1935 passed today because there are not just a handful of outrageously wealthy people in the United States now...there are a lot of them. All the campaign finance reform discussions are about putting an end to them being able to buy our democracy. They never want to see anything like the Revenue Act of 1935 come down the pike again and there are enough of them to prevent that from ever happening. Now while this group thrives the middle class gets totally soaked and the poor are pointed at by the wealthy as the ones that are sucking the middle class dry. They are a burden that drains our economy and takes money out of middle class pockets according to our most wealthy citizens...that have loopholes galore to allow them to avoid paying back into the "American dream."

Ah, it takes nothing but a little common sense to see the poor are not the problem. The problem is the wealthiest people in this country are greedy as all get out...something the founding fathers knew was destructive to a democracy...and their contributions to political campaigns ensure the system stays broken and only works for the biggest contributors. The campaign process now goes on 24/7/365 because as soon as a politician is elected he is running for reelection and the media is covering him 24/7/365 and he is going back to that super wealthy 1% looking for the money to run his never ending campaign.

The people paying for how the campaign system works do not want it to change and politicians that were elected because they raised the most money...and political campaign consultants will tell you the guy that raises the most money wins most of the time...are not going to bite the hand that feeds them.

I will leave it at that for now but I will say that I do believe we can change things for the better. To have any hope I can't just think the problem is most of the people that are voting for a guy like Trump are idiots...I think some of them probably are poorly educated and poorly informed but I think most of them are just so angry and abused by a system that has worked against them instead of for them they see this as a valid response.