You're getting to the old split between "developmental" and "representative" democracy. American democracy has usually been the latter (Madison's Federalist Pap

You're getting to the old split between "developmental" and "representative" democracy. American democracy has usually been the latter (Madison's Federalist Papers) with stretches of the former (Jackson, later populism). The dynamics aren't really new, it's that introduction of unrestrained information which is unprecedented and destabilizing.