The idea that "outing" racists and fascists does not work is completely false and there is substantial data to reject this notion. Anyone with a library card can disprove this assertion.
Both Ken Lawrence and I (and many others) have been involved in successful campaigns to publicly confront racists and fascists in the US.
There is an excellent book called "When Hate Groups Come to Town" that describes how various communites mobilized succesfully. http://www.publiceye.org/cdr/cdrwhenh.html
There are also a number of academic studies in sociology.
Here is a tidbit from "Right WIng Populism in America" on how negative publicity hurt Duke in Louisiana:
"One of the tasks of the Louisiana Coalition Against Racism and Nazism, a multiracial and religiously diverse group that successfully mobilized many voters to oppose Duke's 1990 Senate bid, was to demand that news media actually report on the evidence demonstrating that Duke continued to be an apologist for Hitler and promote racism and antisemitism."
"In 1989, while Duke was in the Louisiana state legislature, Beth Rickey, a Republican who fought to censure Duke, gained headlines when she revealed she had just purchased books and tapes with overt neonazi, white supremacist, and antisemitic themes from Duke's legislative offices, giving the lie to Duke's claims to have reformed."
"Many in the human relations community (and the Republican Party) argued that giving Duke any publicity, even negative publicity, would only encourage his supporters. The Center for Democratic Renewal disagreed, citing polls taken before and after the "Nazi books" episode: over three months, Duke's base of support remained unchanged at 23 percent of Louisiana voters, but the number who opposed him rose from 39 to 60 percent."