That is what is going on here. They have flipped patriotism on its head. Patriotism is not following anyone blindly.
You may want to define patriotism as being cooly rational, donating to charity, or whatever positive virtues you like. But that definition doesn't describe a certain human reality that we need a word for: love of one's group, where that group is the nation/country.
In some places, tribalism is so strong that the tribe trumps the country -- this is generally true in Africa, and also true to a big extent in Muslim countries which are unfortunate enough to have Sunni Shia diversity. It's generally true where there is powerful ethnic diversity: Yugoslavia, Sri Lanka, even in Ukraine where a significant minority think of themselves as Russian rather than Ukrainian.
But in countries which have undergrown sufficient economic/social growth, the tribes get dissolved -- as a rule, but there are exceptions -- and this 'group love' gets transferred to the state. Most if not all European countries, long ago, had diverse tribal groups which got crunched up and, over time, reconstituted as a 'nation'. (Spain is an example where this has not completely happened: thus the Basques and Catalans.)
Until about 50 years ago, Americans both Left and Right, the great majority anyway, loved their country, even if they were critical of its rulers. The pro-Communist folk singer Woody Guthrie's most famous song celebrates America -- "This Land is Your Land".
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Starting in the 1960s, this began to change, first of all with the young anti-war activists who were repulsed by Southern racial oppression, and the American actions in the war in Vietnam.
These people went on to become professors and teachers, and we now see this attitude towards the country -- that it's founded on colonial conquest and slavery and xyz-phobia ---, very widespread among the young college-going/went generation.
The influence of the educational intelligentsia is not the only factor -- the fact that, in reality, America, because of its geographic position and great economic/military strength, is not threatened by any foreign power, means that one driver of patriotism -- you need a country to protect you -- is absent.
But the non-college Americans retain the traditional attitude towards their country. They love their country, think it's pretty good compared to all the others -- even with respect to treatment of racial minorities -- and are patriots.
This does NOT mean that they are all, or even in their majority, well-informed, cool, rational thinkers. That desirable quality is orthogonal to patriotism ... even a bit in tension with it.
Patriotism is one expression of altruism ... just as loyality to your genetic kin is. It's a step up from genetic-kin loyalty, just as the latter is a step up from total selfishness.
Anyway, you may hate them because of their views, you may think that they're white supremacists/male chauvinists/homo/trans/MAP-phobes, and stupid ones to boot, but there is no question that they think that
(1) they love America, and
(2) that the Left does not.
And they're right.