Astroturfing

From dKosopedia

Producing the illusion of broad grass-roots support by top down actions. For example: A templated Letter to the Editor expressing wingnut outrage at an imagined liberal offense that is duplicated and sent to city newspapers across the country as if it were penned by a local reader. Local papers never fail to publish the artificial letters and thus OpEd pages from coast-to-coast are carpeted with artificial grass-roots or "AstroTurf".