It's important, I think, to add that like all the best con-men the top media people believe their own bullshit.

I have a relative who is a genuine New York media elite. Can't talk to her at all. Trump supporters to her are drooling racists, that's it! No discussion. I try a Taibbian argument (you guys made this cake by selling drama and "narratives" while acting as corporate satraps). Nope! Wrong! I completely screwed the pooch when I suggested that Harvey Weinstein would never get a fair trial, and that should worry self-described liberals like her. Bam, no good, bad, scare bath! I added that he was a bona fide asshole from everything I'd heard and probably guilty of some if not all the shit he was accused of. My point was that he wouldn't get a fair trial. It was an ACLU-sticking-up-for-the-Nazis kind of thing. Didn't matter. She was like "how DARE you!" Suddenly I was a Trumpist, a sexist pig and a right wing Republican -- even though my politics have always been well to the left of hers.