I think politicians across the board are completely out of touch with the average US citizen. Some more than others, but in general they're from old money, Harvard educated, go golfing with CEOs, etc. It's always been this way, right down to the founding fathers.
replyWhich isn't entirely a bad thing. The issues facing the world and the country are so much bigger than they used to be 200 years ago and aren't getting smaller. They require an entire team of educated people to fix. If only they weren't so corrupt. But since power corrupts, I'm not sure that's something that's even fixable at longer timescales.
There is one economic class that controls essentially all mass media, and even if their chosen candidates are 'out of touch' they can just blast every channel with propaganda until voters have the slogans burned into their memory.
replyThere was a moment where a single channel, Tiktok, wasn't under their control, and they managed to force congress to force a takeover of that platform as well.