Come on, 8 billion people all owning a modest sized home in a walkable neighbourhood?...

Because Trump has no mob ties to the Middle East. Read Catherine Belton Putin's people, and you will know why Trump doesn't move against his beloved Putin. The Russsian information nyx helped getting him elected. DT wants the same oligarchic system. Other reasons are historic ties and Real Politik

As Hannah Arendt said, the belonging is more important than the lies, even if it damages one's self interest.

Making people care that they are being lied to is also key.

It is easy to expose the lies of Trump and other populist politicians, but people want the lies. Even when those lies are against their material self-interest.

Like the X-Files motto, they want to believe.

What do you suggest? That's an excellent rant but what direction do you suggest we "adapt"?

People won’t trust courts or parties. They won’t believe evidence. They’ll be certain their side is right, no matter what reality says.
That’s not disagreement. That’s epistemic fracture. And once it sets in, it’s nearly impossible to reverse.

In its place: an algorithmic chaos where every citizen is a broadcaster, every feed a battleground, and every truth contestable. We didn’t design for this. We didn’t adapt in time. And now the cracks are widening

We built 20th-century democracies on the assumption that truth could be verified, public discourse could be deliberated, and those in power could be held accountable.
But the system those assumptions relied on, gatekeepers, shared facts, institutional trust, are in decline, and deservedly so.