hybridous - "...It's things like THIS that make me pause and consider the possibility that they actually believe their own nonsense..."
Bingo.
Doubling down and painting themselves even further into ideological corners despite evidence they're wrong, covering up egregious criminal acts, passive-aggressively provoking the Legal System, demonizing anything "worldy" even if the Org might benefit from it...
...virtually all the weird-ass decisions and policies they make and follow simply aren't the kind of pragmatic, "real-world" things than cynical demagogues do.
But they're definitely the kind of are-they-crazy-or-just-plain-stupid calls that True Believers would make...
...especially if a cornerstone of their belief system involved their own victorious destiny being snatched from the jaws of defeat and handed to them on a silver platter.