I can't be the only one wondering how the politicians of tomorrow are going to spin the Facebook posts and Twitter tweets that they're generating today.
During any given election season, political mudslingers dig up old college newsletters or newspaper articles where their opponents may have said something potentially spin-worthy. Their resources are limited, however, and rarely extend past the point that their opponent became a public figure and therefore news-worthy.
Nowadays, however, anywhere between 25% and 50% of Americans have Facebook accounts, and that probably skews young. There will be no shortage of embarrassing photos, awkward tweets, and ill-advised posts made in a brief moment of insanity (the so-called "teenage years").
The more I thought about it, though, the more I started to lean towards "it won't matter." Politicians are naturally shameless to begin with and besides, these social media accounts are so ubiquitous that their opponents will probably have one too, leading to a MAD scenario.
Regardless, it will be interesting to see how it plays out. With Myspace and Facebook hitting nine and eight years old, respectively, the standard teenage early-adopter will be halfway through their law degree by now. Give them another decade and we'll start to see the fireworks.
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