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Principal/agent problems are inherent to a republican government, and public debate doesn't solve them one bit.
Consider for example the housing issue - where people prevent the new construction to conserve value of their own, or the pensions issue, where they're getting nice pensions paid for by money taken from wages of people who are never going to get anything once they're old.
But how does keeping secrets solve either of those issues?
You could probably be more likely to pass a reform of construction if you are able to lie about it. Developers paying off a party, even though it's going to suffer a short-term electoral setback is possible, because they know in the long term it's needed and they'll get something out of it.
Under public conditions, it's impossible, no? They'd get destroyed and coordinating a vote out in the open would be extremely hard.
You can probably be more likely to pass something to benefit yourself and your cronies and hurt the people if you are able to lie about it too, which seems like it would be a bigger effect.
So far politics have gotten far worse than they were before social media. E.g. do you really think the Democratic Party in the US would be championing Drag Queen Story Hour without social media campaigns and activist pressure ? Traditional media could gatekeep the freaks out, or at least it tried.
We'll see in a decade where we are, I guess.
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Well, as the blog observed, politics has gone more, not less insane with the rise of social media, so.. I guess we'll wait and see.
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