I know this is partly shorthand, and probably partly accurate. But I'm not sure it's quite adequate to describe MAGA -- in part, because in cults, it's usually the cult leader who compares himself to God or the like. But with MAGA, that stuff is coming from the bottom. Trump retweets it because he loves it, but until very recently, he wasn't exactly selling himself as the God-King. I don't know; maybe all his bluster about his talents and abilities functions that way. I'm no expert on cults.
But what I see with this nonsense about Trump being "honest" or "principled" or "patriotic" is a form of buyer's remorse in denial. Trump's supporters went all in on Trump, at times with fever pitch. Then he turned out to be exactly what liberals said he was. MAGA turned out to be what we said it was. They exposed themselves. So they desperately need to find something could about him to justify their continuing support. The adjectives that are most hilariously attached to him all address his inner motivations. I find that telling. It allows them to segment the Trump they see, from the Trump they hope for. None of his supporters call him a great administrator; that's farcical on its face. They don't brag about all the stuff he did for them, and they don't require him to even remotely suggest anything tangible he will do for them in the future. Rather, they focus on the qualities that allow them to fashion him into someone worthy of their support, no matter how bad he is.
Because the reality is that most MAGAs actually like all his "mean tweets." When they say, "I wish he'd tweet less," they aren't being honest with themselves. That's what they like, and they backfill the rest. When they say that his tweeting or statements are a problem, what they mean is that it becomes more difficult for them to keep up the fiction that he's not what liberals say he is.
