Driftglass is certainly onto something here with the conservative mindset.
It reminds me somewhat of people I've known who are in the breakup stages of an emotionally abusive relationship. In those final moments, post breakup, they convince themselves that this person who has shit on them and who they've been fighting with for months or more is the most wonderful perfect human being on the planet and they feel the deepest and truest love for them that could ever be felt by anyone. In the middle of the trauma of a rough breakup it's easier to seize on that than the alternative (truth) - that you just wasted a few years with a truly awful awful person.
