( CNN ) -- I make a living encouraging politicians and candidates to use social media . And now I 'm going to tell them why it 's a bad idea . Not always , mind you -- social media will , and should , continue to play an important role in our political discourse . But the trend has grown so quickly ; I do n't know that anyone has really stopped to consider the implications of moment-by-moment , real-time transparency . I would argue that what we 've gotten is a trade-off , and the jury is still out on whether what we 've lost is worth more than what we 've gained in the process . So before I go about the process of destroying my company 's business model , let 's talk about what we 've gained with social media . The Web and social media have created a level of transparency that never before existed in our country . People sitting at home can research complicated issues with a few clicks of a mouse . Online campaign disclosure databases make pay-for-play politics far more difficult to obfuscate . Instantaneous tweeting of shady government practices -- and the resulting uproar -- means that public bodies are more responsive than ever . But there 's an unintended consequence , too , of over-democratization . Wait , you ask , how can we have too much democracy ? Well for starters , we do n't live in a democracy . We never have , nor should we . We live in a republic , where we elect people to take the tough votes and make the tough decisions for us . And quite honestly , politicians should have some level of flexibility to cast votes that -- gasp -- we might not like , without their every action becoming a referendum via Twitter and Facebook . A quote sometimes attributed incorrectly to Alexis de Toqueville goes , `` The American Republic will endure until the day Congress discovers that it can bribe the public with the public 's money . '' Today the same sentiment could be said about the danger of shutting naysayers up on Twitter and Facebook . Too many politicians are n't voting their conscience , they 're voting to placate blog commenters , and that 's no way to run government . Secondly , it 's one thing to see the sausage get made . It 's another thing entirely to watch the pig get slaughtered . There 's a domino effect when it comes to transparency . In policy making , lots of ideas are thrown out in order to set the good apart from the bad , and in order to stake out a position for compromise . Cynics would refer to it as `` backroom deal-making in a smoke-filled room . '' But here 's the harsh reality -- that 's how bills get passed . And it 's how every important collaborative effort since the dawn of the written word has been achieved . After all , do you think the Constitution would have ever been written if Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton had Twitter accounts ? Third , government by social media leads to an environment where in every setting a politician has to be `` on . '' When politicians are hashing out ideas , those ideas can range somewhere between politically untenable and electorally suicidal . Once they 're tweeted -- be it by a journalist or a rival politician -- they become TV ad , direct mail , and attack e-mail fodder . During the discussion , an idea is thrown out about `` What would be the implication of zeroing out funding for popular program X ? '' Suddenly , that politician is facing hundreds of thousands of dollars in negative ads back home , telling his constituents that he `` considered '' or `` proposed '' eliminating X . Two weeks ago , Mitt Romney made a passing reference to eliminating HUD . It wo n't be long before President Obama 's team is cutting ads about Romney `` proposing '' that we leave millions of Americans homeless . Factually accurate ? Sure , but misleading as hell . The result is a political discourse that is becoming devoid of real ideas , and instead pared down to the safest of talking points . And because most politicians draw their own districts to shield against a viable challenge from the opposite party , they are far more susceptible to electoral defeat in the summer than they are in the fall . Their audience in everything they do is the primary voter , not the swing voter . So the rhetoric throughout the year from both parties is increasingly divisive , increasingly partisan , and increasingly destructive to any kind of progress . Is any of this a product of social media ? No , absolutely not . American politics have been trending this way for decades . But technology has expedited our descent toward a political system devoid of real ideas and bold , controversial thought . As the use of social media accelerates , it 's incumbent upon everyone involved in the political process to make sure its power is used to harness everything good about the American political system , rather than to hasten political trends that are hurting our republic . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Wesley Donehue .
Wesley Donehue : Social media gives people unprecedented ability to see political process . He says there 's a risk politicians will become too dependent on Twitter , Facebook . Compromise , productive bills happen behind closed doors , not transparently , he says . Donehue : Politicians have to lead and represent the people , not become slavishly responsive .