Yeah, all of the major subreddits are gamed, especially subs like r/politics. Even going back to the 2016 election it was clear that much of the activity on there was not genuine.
There was also a marked increase in moderation at the beginning of the Ukraine war in related subreddits
Yeah. Arguably Reddit has embraced inorganic activity since beginning. the founders used it to grow the site and pretend they had more active users.