Add new comment

1

All opinions are welcome here when they're presented as yours are.

The increasing polarization of the USA is more than troubling--it's approaching calamity like only seen once before in the USA's young history.  That gives no pleasure to say, but I think it's the most accurate statement that can be said on the matter.

As to DJT's penchant for direct-to-the-masses communication via social media, I've got to take the other side.  I flat out love reading his twitter storms, because most of the time they demonstrate (via the comments, replies, and retweets) just how out of touch the 'two halves' of America have become.  Want to see people shout past each other?  Go through his Twitter feed a few times a week.  It's *exactly* what you describe: everyone just wants to scream as loudly and frequently as possible to ensure theirs is the first voice heard on the subject.

Personally, I think his Twitter serves as (among other things) a lightning rod of sorts for political discussion.  I'm frankly shocked that Obama didn't mine this medium similarly before him; he had all the charisma and media support, and could have spun any narrative however he wanted with 80% of the media getting his back.

Places like SSI are among the precious few bastions of reasoned debate that I've been able to find.  It's a precious community that Jeff's built here; never hesitate to pop up and chime in.  It makes it better for all of us when you do :-)

Filtered HTML

  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd><p><br>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.

shout_filter

  • Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.