In a way they kinda do. At least in a maintenance sense, a lot of the propaganda isn't even necessarily for bringing in new people but almost exclusively for maintaining the current crop. I've said it before but if they lost even one or two propaganda outlets at the wrong time they'd shit the bed, hell them losing Kirk may very well have had devastating consequences for them.

It makes an absolutely huge difference actually. The presence/absence of a major right-wing propaganda outlet changes local opinion by about five percentage points.

It takes constant effort to push back against objective reality. If the pressure relents they might slide back into seeing the world a little closer to what it is.