I agree and believe that a serious examination on polarization in the U.S. has to account for the wheeling and dealing between tech companies and red/blue politicians (not sure if Klein touches on that, I’d be curious to know if that’s the case). I also rarely see social media’s manipulative design mentioned in these arguments (seems like a bit of a non-starter for a “public square.”)

Instead, as you mention, polarization discussions in the mainstream typically bring in as many variables as possible which mystifies the pay-to-play relationships that dominate the world of “social” media. All of the sudden, it’s not about the business model, but about a particular tweet or post, or a historical analysis of U.S. polarization levels — again, things that have little to do with Subject A paying Facebook a lot of money for targeted access in 2020. This focus on individual tweets/posts (or the opposite: obfuscating straightforward issues) diverts attention from structural problems.