If all the "breaking news" about the tactics used by the Trump team in last year's election were limited strictly to "new" tactics used by the Trump crowd, the volume of "news" released would shrink to a tiny fraction of what it is now. Unfortunately, as always, the problem lies with the ignorance of the American people. Its easy to portray underhanded and/or illegal tactics as being somehow unique to the Trump crowd when most people are entirely ignorant about how our political system works (and has worked) for decades. The fact is that campaigns on every level - local, state, and federal - have used data mining techniques, social media platforms, algorithms, and data of all sorts (both foreign and domestic) to influence everyone that possibly could in every way possible. Shining a bright light on any corner of our putrid political system (as is being done in the case of the Trump crowd) will uncover a host of shady, disreputable and/or illegal acts. It doesn't matter what corner you shine the light on or what party you choose to focus on.

As someone who didn't vote for Trump, and doesn't support him, that's one of the (many) things I find so disheartening about this entire process. Pretending that Trump is somehow a unique problem that needs to be solved rather just another corrupt politician is to whitewash the rest of the crooks running our government. It isn't an accident that Trump is being portrayed as a unique menace. The levers of power in our government (and their minions in media) are very careful to paint the picture of this being an aberration. They are playing on the myth of "American exceptionalism". That's where the whole Russian-conspiracy nonsense plays in, because naturally, the American people would never vote to reject the establishment in favor of a despicable con-man like Trump unless they were influenced or fooled by evil Russians! If we can just get rid of Trump (and the free and open internet that allowed the evil Russians to influence us), then we can return to the wonderful status quo of the "Liberal Western Order" AKA monopolar US global hegemony, that is great for everyone!