I agree completely, but you forget that another option is that the powerful will use these tools to make us suffer and we will be powerless to stop them.
And it's not even just the right leaning that are tricked. The left get thrown a bone now & then on some trivial thing like getting gay marriage (which shouldn't have even been an argument, more of a realisation) meanwhile nothing is done about corporate tax evasion, improving labour laws etc - or they lean too far into their voterbase and allow rampant immigration, welfare handouts without checks & balances etc.
And all of this because managing a large group of human is pretty much impossible. We need to reorganise into smaller groups.