Back when I was a kid the most interesting thing that happened in politics is that Dan Quail misspelled potato, and that was followed years later by the Republicans throwing a fit over Bill Clinton getting a B.J.. We were always able to discuss politics with people who had different ideas until after Limbaugh, and later Hannity talked a bunch of people over the brink. Even after that, it was only the crazies that you couldn't talk to. The internet made things worse, but it didn't get really bad until smart phones and Facebook gave every idiot on the planet an equal platform from which to speak from.