Except freedom of Speech and of Information were always believed to be the heart of a healthy democracy, that decisions and policy were best set out by an informed and educated electorate.

Not only is our electorate not very well educated, but if anything, we've seen that the wide availability of literally all human knowledge, which should lead to the best ideas if information = good decisions, has galvanized all parties involved to their own ideas and utterly ruined the concept of compromise. Even the most minor concessions to the other side (whichever other side it might be) is interpreted as weakness, so no politicians compromise, so nothing gets done because no given party ever controls the entire Government. Heck, in the USA, the GOP currently controls the executive and legislative branches and still can do nothing due to their own internal fragmentation.

I'm not sure if the solution is less information, less free speech, that feels wrong to me. But at the same time it's clear what we're doing now is not even remotely working. It's breaking the entire system.