But that hasn't changed. If anything it's going to be far worse. The owner of Twitter is literally going to be part of the Federal government. It seems naive to think he won't manipulate or censor it on behalf of the government or his own interests.

Also, its "format" probably contributed significantly to political polarization: specifically, restricting tweets to 140 characters made it tedious for a writer to provide and a reader to obtain a detailed explanation of anything, but made it easier for a writer to join a mob with a simple message.