I don't generally feel like there's much in the news that either discusses anything I care about. Or, to the extent that issues I care about are discussed, they come at it from such a strange angle that the discourse is mostly frustrating, or disappointing. (quick example, I heard a piece on NPR about how people are turning to LLMs for therapy. The commentator's solution? We NEED robust LLMs that are trained in psychology datasets and have the right guardrails for psychology.) For the rest of the HN crowd, imagine any news story from a mainstream outlet about issues of privacy or security. The commentary is completely worthless, except perhaps for informing you about where some of the general public may be on the issue.
In other words, for me personally, it's not sure that following politics has very much real utility value. I can just research a candidate when I go to vote. The only direct referendums I can vote on are town-level and have nothing to do with national matters. I donate to a few causes I like, and otherwise I have effectively zero say in how these things turn out. This means I'd be far better off reading a book, doing chores, or thinking about how I can improve the quality of my life than paying attention to the news whatsoever.