My fav. Milton Friedman often use to say that "Democracy is not about winning 51% of votes, it is about finding 5% of people who say they will vote for you if you take up their pet issue and they do not care how you vote on other issues. Then you selected another 5% of people with some other pet issue and so on. Together it should come to 51%".

What you are describing however is the opposite of this. People do not care how horrible a policy being proposed is, if it does not impact them or their loved ones. The conservatives who are flying "thin blue line" are the same people who are claiming that Jan 6 capitol riots were actually orchestrated by FBI and other branches of law enforcements. Conservative love for cops is not based on principles but it is more of a trick to "own the libs". Sooner or later the cops are going to come for the conservatives, for example Biden sending FBI after parents of schoolchildren will eventually be a template for states and cities to target conservatives of different stripes and you will quickly see those "thin blue line" flags going down.

Note how people who smoke marijuana are "addicts" and "junkies" who should be thrown in a pit as per many conservatives even though most of these "junkies" are productive members of society. But when it comes to opioid crisis they claim it is a "health crisis" for which "big pharma" must be held accountable. No one calls the addicts "junkies" or insists they should be sent to jail even though some of them are addicted to a point where they simply can not function normally.