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A similar change has happened to a quite different, but also alike subreddit, /r/simpsonsshitposting. It's not a remotely serious sub, as the name implies, but it is very close in size to /r/npr and has only very recently undergone a transformation into endless US democrat posting. Previously a subreddit where users would poorly smash together different Simpsons scenes, with the occasional current events or political post, in the past month 22 of the top 25 posts are explicitly political. 2 are current events. Just 1 is an actual Simpsons shitpost in the traditional style.
One thing we can rule out with Simpsonsshitposting is bots; unlike NPR, you can't just post links to stories and while there are repost bots the aren't creating new political shitposts. Some of the top recent posts are very much the "arduous journey to read this left wing meme" wall of text (see https://reddit.com/gallery/1dyj5zb, https://reddit.com/gallery/1e3jkeb), which don't really lend themselves to astroturfing either. Why bother typing all that out when you can just post Stampy walking through the Republican convention? Two posters have multiple top posts in the past month, and both look relatively normal. Spectreagent7000 and first level ranger have regular posts in both SS and other subreddits, plenty unrelated to politics.
This suggests to me that either your 2nd or 3rd theories are correct, although there is one another factor you didn't consider: reddit karma. Every large subreddit becomes garbage because of the way reddit is designed, and because people just want easy upvotes. Creating a real simpsonsshitpost is not a huge challenge but it takes a modicum of wit and a great memory for the show. In return you're heavily limiting your audience to others who really know the Simpsons. The US political shitposts above do require more effort, but they don't take any brainpower. You just slap some standard talking points on Frinkiac and reap your reward, which, it is clear, is a much larger audience, with more upvotes and comments. Now that Simpsonsshitposting and NPR are large enough to get onto /r/all through subscriber numbers, the political karma farmers move in.
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