People who hate Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders (or both) can take a small bit of comfort in the story behind their ascension: Politics in America is changing.

At its core, politics is the art of manipulation. An unruly crowd of rightwing or leftwing voters needs corralled into voting booths and enticed to flip the correct lever. They’re a messy bunch, but high-paid political consultants are high paid specifically because they know which metaphorical buttons to push.

In old-school terms (pre-2005), political parties did that with coercion. It was a science. The color of a candidate’s tie, the angle of the sun in photos, the baby kissing, the chili eating, the repeated policy stances written by a group of geeks in some backroom all led voters in one direction.

Today, the Internet and social media nip at the heels of political consultants. The short explanation for the rise of Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump? The consultants no longer control the message – or at least they don’t control it as well as they did before.

In 1999, a viewer who saw 100 ads for a candidate got the impression that he (so few “she’s” back then) had organization, a message and enough support to win. In 2016, the same thing happens when one person’s Facebook feed has 170,000 pro-Trump “shares.” “Wow, most of my friends support Trump,” they think. Some of my friends are smart. There must be something to this Trump fellow.

More importantly, people start to think that Trump can win, and it’s a small leap from “could win” to “he has my vote.”

In Bernie Sanders case, many liberals always thought a single-payer healthcare plan made sense but, until the advent of social media, no politician had the kahunas to say that out loud. If Bernie is talking about something sure to lose an election, he must be one of those rare and endangered species: The politician who actually cares about policies more than votes. Wow. He “could win.” He “has my vote.”

Why this is good

Democracy should empower the individual, not the political party. That “power of the individual” is the core democratic value.

George Washington snagged that first election without benefit of party, social media or TV ads, and he didn’t throw a reporter under a subway train to do it. (“House of Cards” insider joke.)

Compare that first election – a roster of intelligent men who disagreed, sometimes vehemently – with elections today. The rise of political parties, perhaps inevitable, made democracy less democratic.

Can social media and the Internet change that? If one man or woman can get a message directly to everyone, and if the power of political parties is diminished, can we take a few baby steps closer to that first U.S. election where George’s ideas counted and no one assumed that Candidate X and Y were silently colluding behind the scenes to dupe the voting public?

As time passes and candidates no longer need Democrats or Republicans as much, new independence could slowly emerge – if we allow it.

Why this isn’t good

Just as political consultants now manipulate TV ads and candidates’ ties, new-age consultants are finding ways to manipulate social media. Once upon a time, a viral video was just surprisingly popular; today, high-paid consultants consider viral video a new type of super-effective ad and study the nuances of creation. To make a hit on social media, political parties will create witty sayings and put them on top of funny cat pictures in hopes they’ll be shared.

Manipulation didn’t go away, it simply donned a new mask.

Social media opened up a whole new area for political manipulation: Lying has become so much easier. You can now avoid those pesky fact checkers that carry no weight.

On social media, a statement no longer has to have even a snippet of truth to be spread far and wide. One boldfaced lie can be posted once on Facebook and live forever in the digital morass, with another side benefit: The hurt party has no chance for rebuttal. That lying little tidbit emboldens people who hated that candidate in the first place, and they “Share” it like Halloween candy on Oct. 31.

Social media is the voting public’s best chance to wrest political control from the party machines. But, as with television, it’s doubtful we’ll use it wisely. We just love those funny sayings on top of kitty pictures.

It’s our country. It’s our election. Why do we allow smarmy marketing gurus to tell us what to do?

© 2016 SmithTakes.com