Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton speaks at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Thursday, Sept. 10, 2015, in Milwaukee. (Morry Gash/AP)

“Clinton hiring consumer marketing specialists “to help imagine Hillary 5.0.” “

Genuine democracy was about open discussion about all issues of public interest. It worked because openness made it so that the truly stupid (people and ideas) were weeded out before inflicting harm on a large scale.

The problem is that openness needs mutual respect.

Only that has become a thing of the past. Nowadays, when everyone knows better, political ideas are marketed like snake oil used to be not so long ago…

“Clinton’s campaign spent $18.7 million in the second quarter, dramatically more than any other. The mid-July report said she received $815,000 worth of services from strategist Joel Benenson’s firm alone. Since then, the campaign launched a $4 million ad blitz in Iowa and New Hampshire.”

“Steve Schmidt, the Republican strategist, puts it somewhat more crudely: “Trump’s starring in a reality show of his own making, and treats every appearance like an episode,” chasing ratings in the form of fresh votes. But how do you turn appointment TV into a lasting candidacy? “You need a huge team on the ground doing the nuts-and-bolts work — collecting signatures to be on the ballot in certain states, bringing voters to the polls — and Trump is very late to the party,” says Cohn. “Most of his rivals have been at this over a year, and have those seasoned operatives locked up. And even if they’re available, is he really prepared to pay them a premium now?” ”
This third quote is from Rolling Stone’s “Trump Seriously: On the Trail With the GOP’s Tough Guy” by Bob Solotaroff.

I know some of you are quite familiar with these political realities but don’t you get goose bumps about what’s going on, at least occasionally?

How come these species of political operators are so sure about themselves being entitled to do what they are doing that they have no qualms when doing it?

Can any of these occurrences be, even remotely, associated with the concept of democracy? Or have we, all of us, demoted the whole process to just a little more than ‘mob rule’? A contest among spin doctors about who is the more competent manipulator?