Overarching cultural trends shape the context of politics.  At the beginning of our current presidential election cycle, it was assumed that the effect of the Citizens United Supreme Court decision — the entry of big money through unregulated SuperPacs — would reconfigure the primary process.  But money hasn’t mattered so much.  Donald Trump’s expertise as a television personality and new-media manipulator directed through the cable news industry’s gluttonous appetite for entertaining narratives have created a pathway to electoral success that sidesteps the advertising, robocalling, and polling that political money can buy.  But dreadful consequences are hinted; sensation replaces substance; outrage overpowers insight, as free access defeats paid-for messaging.  Once successfully mined, the cultural power of old and new media obviates big money.  Sanders goes small and gets big; no doubt the Kochs, eyeing Trump, look on in shock an dismay!