A survey from the Public Religion Research Institute, with an impressive, mere 1.5% margin of error (because of a sampling universe of more than 5,000 respondents), finds that about one-quarter of Republicans believe in QAnon's theory of "pedophile rings" embedded in government, media and business — and nearly 30% believe that some sort of political rapture will take place, through righteous violence.
I often qualify such shocking findings by conceding that, almost certainly, some unknown yet significant percentage of respondents answer insanely only to stick it to the libs, or simply to go along with the most outrageous conspiracy theories imaginable as prideful evidence of their Trumpian virtue.
But this poll, I believe, is genuine to the core. So many Republicans have parroted crazy for so long, they have, at last, transfigured into crazy itself. I am reminded of an underrated 1964 film — Shock Treatment — in which an asylum's obsessive, increasingly delusional psychiatrist (Lauren Bacall) morphs into actual madness, herself becoming a patient.
It's akin to Trump's pathology. In the beginning he was perhaps lying about his ruthless denial of office. By now, though, after raging maniacally 10 times a day for months about "The Steal," he has taken to seriously believing it. Or so it seems.