I’m on record recommending people watch a YouTube series called “The Alt-Right Playbook.” It’s by a hardcore leftist SJW but it’s worth a watch because it’s the best explication I’ve ever seen of how Very Online extremists behave, argue, interact, etc. The overarching theme is that they act with regard to strategic concerns rather than truth/accuracy/consistency. Each video highlights and names a different technique in the toolbox of such truth-free activists. The blind spot in the series, of course, is that the creator thinks it’s just “the alt-right” who does the things he’s noticed, and not illiberal extremists and agenda-mongers of ALL stripes. So if one can ignore the specific references to political allegiance in the videos and recognize that everything the creator says also applies equally to his own illiberal confederates, the series is endlessly enlightening.

But long story short, what the lefty journalist is doing is a combination of the techniques described in the videos “Never Play Defense” and “The Card Says Moops” from that series.