■ In this week’s Inner Loop:David Gilbert checks in on a new study of how social media creators affect their audiences’ political views. The answer, it turns out, is a lot.
Donald Trump’s appearances on the podcasts of Joe Rogan and Theo Von, among others, were seen by many as a key part of securing his second term in office.
But while Trump was speculating about alien life on Mars with Rogan, he had a team of acolytes appearing on dozens, if not hundreds, of much smaller niche podcasts hosted by right-wing content creators who typically don’t talk about politics.
This is how, just six days before the election, Kash Patel, the man now struggling to run the FBI, ended up appearing on the Deplorable Discussions livestream, a fringe, QAnon-infused show hosted on a platform called Pilled...
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