polarization

Polarization is tearing at the seams of democracies around the world, from Brazil and India to Poland and Turkey.

What frazzled pollsters, surly op-ed pages, snarling cable talkfests and issue-starved candidates for office need is a fresh source of hot-eyed national polarization.

We don’t usually notice polarization because direct sunlight and light from ordinary incandescent and fluorescent bulbs is unpolarized: it contains equal mixtures of horizontally a…