Policy in a functioning democracy evolves through the fusion of opposing viewpoints, a key advantage over dictatorial forms of government. But democracy in America is plainly broken. The country is so polarized that consensus is out of reach, so policy staggers left and right, depending on which party momentarily holds power on topics as basic as vaccine policy, climate change, and immigration.

Politics has boiled over into the courts with criminal prosecutions of political figures, election disputes, and constitutional challenges to policy actions on an unprecedented scale. Public faith in government is undeniably at a nadir.

Blaming politicians is the common tonic, but the reality is today's political figures are a product of the problem, not the cause. The prime fault lies in the information environment, the foundation of any democracy.

In times past, there were typically a few local newspapers in a given market. At the national level, an assortment of print media and three broadcast networks rounded out the nation's information system. While there were diverse voices, journalistic principles dominated the news. Facts were relevant, and credibility was gold, as evidenced by how the three broadcast networks competed for public trust through their lead news personalities.

But today, social media and other digital platforms, devoid of editorial discipline, have become the dominant source of information for much of the public, while a fractured broadcast media finds it possible, even necessary, to pander to select opinion segments. In the new media, the messenger is the paying customer, not the reader, and the ability to target audience segments means that confirmation bias supplants the need for credibility. Facts are akin to Schrödinger's Cat; they can be whatever you imagine as long as you........

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