Not only that: the people screaming the loudest still get the most attention, partly because they stand out against the backdrop of a pendulating wall of sound that is now the room tone of our collective mental lives. Suffice it to say, the result was not really a better party, nor the conversation of equals that many of us had hoped for. And it was in this setting that the guy with the loudest megaphone, the most desperate, keening need for attention in perhaps the nation’s history, rose to power.
