We live in cynical times. Indeed, the modern corporation can be a highly cynical, authoritarian organization, rife with manipulation and insecurity and offering little room for dissent. Of course, there are good reasons to be cynical. Politicians do lie. Corporate CEOs do enrich themselves at their employees' expense.
Big money does corrupt elections.
Well, there's talk radio, where hosts package smug, bullying skepticism and then mislabel it as intellectual daring. Or evening news programs where preferences are based more on personality or hair styles than discernable differences in viewpoint. And, then, of course, there are the copy writers for Slate, who think that an attitude of hip, condescending detachment is an attractive, marketable quality. No wonder so many Americans think politics and social activism are a hopeless game. Certainly it's an understandable attitude.