But I think there is a fair amount of evidence from this election that the increased velocity of idea transmission on media like Twitter made it impossible to dilute. That's one of the factors in information spread models, and it seems relevant here.

The alt-right used to be in their own walled garden echo chambers: Breitbart, Stormer etc. Now Steve Bannon is two months from being chief-of-staff in the Whitehouse.

So I guess that didn't work out so well.