Almost 60 years ago
The Paranoid Style in American Politics was published in Harpers Magazine in November of 1964. Written by Richard Hofstadter it deserves to be read on a regular basis. Within the essay one can see the very current that exists today. It is amazing. Sure, the names have changed, but the technique is being employed with the power and reach of the internet. No longer mimeographed pages, this style of fear now propagates on blogs, Twitter, Youtube, and thousands of other digital sources.
https://harpers.org/archive/1964/11/the-paranoid-style-in-american-politics/