Tyrrell: OK, you seem to be serious, smart, thoughtful, and genuinely trying hard. For these reasons I think that you will eventually make an important contribution to the discussion of these subjects. However, it seems to me that you lack a great deal of background experience or familiarity with real public debate as it exists today in the US. I would recommend the book "The Myth of the Rational Voter" as a very partial correction to what seem to be seriously mistaken beliefs about how deliberation takes place and even about what most people think argument is or should be.