You've got a good point there in that news isn't real life. This reminds me of this Venn diagram, where the small loud extremes are at the left and right edges of the diagram, and the large majority of normal people are in the middle, who often just go about their usual day. I do not live in America, so all I know is from news; various different news outlets, but still.. it's just news. I'll take your 'on the ground' experience to heart and hope that my world view is just simply biased. I also take into account that when people are living in a situation, that situation becomes their baseline normal. So who is to say.. I don't know.. I hope you are right.