If they keep kicking the can down the road they’ll eventually make it to January 20, 2024 where they have a shot more in line with reality. Never underestimate the ability of True Believers to handwave away predictions that don’t work out. Jehovah’s Witnesses are up to six armageddens now – seven if you count a vaguely worded prediction about before the end of the 20th century – and they are still arouund.
I was thinking earlier that this is remarkably like the predictions of the Rapture that never came true. A remarkably large number of people have the ability to just shrug and say “Well, I guess the new date predicted by our leader is actually the correct one.”
This is the same thing applied to a secular object.
The problem is that such preparations are kinda expensive politically. All those troops would need to be called up again. All those National Guard called into duty, which would likely be enough of a deterrent that, once again, nothing would happen.
And since it’s not like they’ll get what they actually want—causing enough disruption to make Trump president—I think simply not being in session still acts as a deterrent.
Sure, if they keep doing this thing of moving it back over and over, such a tactic isn’t sustainable, either. But I’m okay with it this one time.
I expect that, on March 20, though, they’ll just put up a small show of extra force rather than shut down again. And then they’ll do nothing after that for whatever day they move it to.
I wonder whether it’s possible to just push this sort of believing along a little bit further.
If they don’t need to worry about Biden’s appearing to be POTUS because they think Trump’s still in control, then surely they don’t need to do anything about it, do they? And if Trump’s really in control, then no sense in their bothering to do anything about all those people pretending to be Congress, is there? And if Trump’s really in control, then the wall must have actually been built and all the Wrong People™ must have been pushed out, so all those apparently diverse people they see on the street must just be actors, so of course the right thing to do must be to be nice to them and play along, right?
They can go cheerfully on thinking the country’s already exactly how they want it to be, and therefore stay home and not shoot anybody or blow anybody up.
It’s not just the Rapture, it seems to be a common cult phenomenon. Prophet Leader says X will happen on Y date. Y arrives, X does not. A few people will say ‘hmmm, PL must not be a prophet after all.’ Way too many of PL’s followers will instead cheerfully accept PL saying ‘New Vision! Actual date is Y+Z!’ Often things keep right on going long after PL is mouldering in the grave.
I’m not so sure the people believing QAnon do think they’re dealing with a secular object; I think they’re perilously close to, if not already at, Prophet Trump. But then, it’s always seemed suspicious to me that people objecting to flag burning so often use the word “desecration.”