3. Did the Federal Policy Contribute?

The 1987 Communication Industry Fairness Doctrine was eliminated.
Radio Stations were no longer required to present contrasting views.
Rush Limbaugh, who had popularized conservative talk radio, now had fewer restrictions.
Talk Radio and Identity Politics Flourished.
Conservative and Liberal Polarization Proliferate

4. Telecommunications Act of 1996
allowed multi-station company ownership and national network developed.
As of 2011, Clear Channel Communications
 (now  iHeart Media ) owned over 800 US radio stations and
  Rush Limbaugh wealth eventually climbed to $400 million. ^[3] 

5. Citizens United v. FEC 
Allowed Increased Political Contributions
Campaign funding increased and sponsorship diversified,
 which supported both intended and unintended Fake News.

6. Sports Trash Talking Went Public
Mohamed Ali practically invented this 1960's genre
 as a boastfully Cassius Clay.
Athlete had been formal, cordial, and boring.
Ali changed everything with his elite out-of-ring bantering
 which was only rivaled by his in-ring dominance.
Larry Bird and others soon followed.

Epilog
I recently began adding political economy studies to Quick Notes Economics.
Studied were U.S. history and presidential politics.
Then came biographies of influential presidents.
Today I am studying the 4th populist-terrorist episode to the post WW 1 United States.

Educators had long been acting as if the normal curve did not apply to academic education.
It would be the great equalizer and solve most issues.
They were wrong. This failure added to our anxiety.

Then the Great Recession created many hardships in rural areas and the Rust Belt.
Government efforts helped few-mainly ambitious individual who had move to urban areas.

Equal educational opportunities were not enough.
More Education spending was not the answer.
Unbiased observers knew that nature and nurture were not equally distributed.
Education Change was needed.

Special blame goes to the politicians, economists and other professionals.
Economic success and political stability from 1980-2000 fostered technocrats control.
Too often technocrats provided inadequate, bias Information that was not applicable to a particular issue.
There failures are the real Fake News.
It is more dangerous than the fake news coming from lies,
once called Yellow Journalism and Propaganda.

The Great Society created a time bomb.
The explosion was delayed by the Reagan Revolution and then by fifteen years of economic prosperity.
Then the dot com bubble ended prosperity , 9/11 bought the matches and the Great Recession lit the fuse.
Then Gay Rights put a psychological hurt on many middle class white Christians.
 Finally, a black President’s health care plan took many back to the beginning,
to their Great Society/ Roe v Wade animosity.
Trump's election signified a new Populism.
 It is much like our other 20th Century Populism episodes.

Democracy is supposed to be troublesome. Those most unhappy can raise Cain.
Oligarchs run the show and maximize their wealth from our ever growing economic pie.
Populism caused the Civil War, the Revolutionary War and the King Phillips War.
By accepting more responsibility, Oligarchs could avert a forth devastating event.
Baby Boomers are leaving populist issues to Millennials
who may take control during what some consider a Fourth Turning.
source.

See Can We Talk or is Civil Discourse Dead

Polarity Cycles

Low US Civility Began With the Founders

Federalists painted Jefferson "a crafty, fanatical, “contemptible hypocrite.”
and attacked his moral character, alleging he was an atheist and
a coward during the revolution.

"Callender...a political hack." exposed Hamilton's affair with a married women,
whose husband colluded in the seduction.
Blackmail and rumors of financial improprieties led some lawmakers to investigate, but
Congressman William Branch Gail of Virginia eventually concluded that the President fire Hamilton,
 but even this leaser resolution did not pass.
 Federalist felt this was a partisan attack.