"US President" is of course not synonymous with "politician"; even if we look at just the US, minor politicians that are only of limited local interest can now

"US President" is of course not synonymous with "politician"; even if we look at just the US, minor politicians that are only of limited local interest can now run the risk of becoming a target of a sea of vitriol, in Twitter or elsewhere. If I look at Dutch Twitter then it's basically a small army of extremely motivated trolls with a lot of spare time who will comment on what seems like every single political tweet so that basically any engagement in any way has become all but impossible. These are people who call the Dutch equivalent of the Tories "extreme left" and consider anyone on the "extreme left" a traitor and fair target for seemingly anything. Imagine every single comment you make on HN having several hundred replies ranging from calling you an asshole, to accusing you of all sorts of "crimes", to threatening to literally cut your throat. These things really do wear you down, especially if you're not really looking for the limelight, which most politicians aren't really (for every MP you can name there are a dozen more backbenchers).