I haven't been back in decades but even in the 1960s, Manhattan was a place where if you didn't know everyone of note in a certain circle--Irish, Jewish, Chinese, whatever--you pretended you did.
Same thing is going on in Hollywood. The kids, grandkids and associates of the Hollywood Ten as well as the entire movie industry has a mythology built up around McCarthy and the blacklist.
Ann Coulter has taken on some deeply held beliefs.