MTG is playing a character to get votes. She isn’t stupid.

She's also not the only one, she's just low hanging fruit. This same point can be made about Trump, and as you know, he has a lot of dedicated followers who are smart, functioning adults. Not Gen Z.

votes are part of it; she's also drawing attention away from other topics the GOP would prefer to not get looked at...

...like how all of the GOP voted against federal aid for the hurricane victims, esp. several in southern states that got hit.

I guess my point is that we as a society have allowed things to get to a point where some of our brightest students have graduated highschool without ever reading a book, or having to focus their attention undivided for the duration of a short poem.

What kind of society produces kids like that? Our values have changed focus from effort, hard work and self improvement to ease, comfort and a one-dimensional notion of happiness. It's a downward spiral.

And MTG is 50 and she has to know what she's spouting is nonsense, so why does she spout it? Is her audience really that dimwitted, or is there something else at play? For example, is this part of some mass brainwashing ploy? Are they Jim Jonesing millions of Americans? If so, then to what end?

That's where I'm at a loss.

Are all the people parroting this stuff actually believers? My instinct is that the majority tried to grab the bull by the horns by jumping on the Trump schtick when he took power and are now left riding this increasingly deranged and unpredictable animal. At this point they can do nothing but try to keep holding on lest they be trampled by the beast they created.

But there's also gotta be true believers in there, and yeah, I don't know what those people actually want, and it's pretty scary.

If you can establish a base of support populated by the easily fooled then you can grift them indefinitely.