Have you ever seen someone in a relationship with someone (often abusive) who they’ve built up a fantasy of their partner and fully believe that person to be the same one as the ideal they’ve crafted in their head? And they ignore clear red flags, make apologies and excuses for that person, and heartily swallow any and all lies that person tells as a way of holding onto that fantasy? And then when they finally snap, reach a breaking point and that person turns on them and they see them for who they really are and tell themselves that the person changed because they can’t face the idea that they were complicit in that person’s behavior and don’t want to believe they were capable of enabling them? This is the political version of that.