The PLPF
A key field of study to the way humans communicate in the 21st century is signals. Signals are ways of encoding information into a physical phenomenon, like a voltage, as computers use, or an electromagentic wave, as cell phones use. When analyzing a signal, there are usually high-frequency and low-frequency oscillations. Frequency is the number of oscillations in a given unit of time or space. Here are a high frequency and low frequency signal.
Figure 1: High (top) and Low Frequency (bottom) Oscillations
Often times, a signal will have both a high frequency and low frequency oscillation, as shown below. Notice how there’s a general up-and-down trend of the smaller peaks and valleys. The general trend is the low frequency oscillation, and the smaller peaks and valleys are the high frequency oscillation.
Figure 2: Mixed Frequency Oscillation
In some cases, one of these types is the actual signal that’s encoding information, and the other type is just noise - variation introduced by imperfections in the system. In these cases, the signal is processed by either a high-pass filter (HPF), which lets only the high frequency oscillations through, or a low-pass filter (LPF), which lets only the low frequency oscillations through. How exactly these filters are implemented is not important for us in this post.
Figure 3: Output of a High-Pass and Low-Pass Filter
Now that I’ve laid the ground work, let’s get into politics. In politics, there are both high frequency and low frequency oscillations. The high frequency oscillations are the day-to-day news about what politician A said to politician B, stock market numbers, fundraising and polling numbers, proposals made. Then there’s the low frequency oscillations, which are things that actually change the baseline of day-to-day life in the USA: bills passed, judicial rulings, judges appointed, wars waged, allegiances made.
The point of making this distinction is simple: the low frequency oscillations are what actually matter. It’s probably good to check in with the high frequency changes here and there just to have an idea of what’s going on, but the low frequency changes are the ones that will have a lasting impact on the way our country works.
The problem is, you can’t form a 24-hour news station around the low frequency oscillations. Firstly, there isn’t enough low frequency news to fill up that time, as its name suggests. Additionally, people’s attention is easier kept by the bite-sized high frequency news than the low frequency news, which will likely include dense political jargon and longer discussions of implications. This leads to the electorate being under-informed about what really matters, which hurts the strength of our democracy. We need people to have a political low-pass filter, or a PLPF, but instead the capitalism-driven media gives them a high-pass filter.
The Trump presidency has been an exploitation of this fact. Two of the biggest low frequency changes that have happened in that time have been 192 judges, many being unqualified, being appointed to federal courts, and 98 environmental regulations being pulled back. The regulations can hopefully be reestablished, that takes a liberal majority in the Senate, but appointed judges have a lifetime term, so that change will be felt for an entire generation, unless the courts are somehow reformed. However, the biggest low frequency change by far has to be the precedents set: the Executive branch doesn’t have to listen to the Legislative branch, and crimes can be committed in broad daylight as long as the criminal’s party controls the Senate. These threaten the very foundation of our democracy.
While all this happened, most Americans were distracted by the high frequency oscillations Trump has put on with his quotes and tweets, scandal after scandal, and drama within his cabinet. Trump is almost certainly the largest source of high frequency news this country has ever seen. The Republicans in power have loved having him as president even though many of them were vocally opposed to him before he was elected, and that’s partially because Americans by and large do not have a political low-pass filter.
Path Forward
The most important thing to do is stop eating up the gossip-style, high frequency news, thinking that’s all the news there is. Again, some is probably a good idea, but the priority needs to lie in staying up-to-date on the low frequency changes. Pay more attention to articles about bills and judicial rulings and spend your political attention span understanding what they mean for the future.
