The Real Sedevacantists

I've probably mentioned it before, but I have a great deal of pity for sedevacantists. I think most of them are good people who, quite frankly, were so traumatized by the events of the last few decades that they couldn't hold it together and abandoned the Church.

It always makes me wonder what they would have done if they'd been around for guys like Benedict IX.

It's very easy to focus on the more organized groups of sedes, but let's face it. There aren't that many of them, and lots of Catholics probably don't even know they exist.

Are they the only ones, though? What exactly are we to make of the Nancy Pelosis, Joe Bidens, and Peggy Noonans of the world? In those sorts of folks, you clearly have the mindset that there is a guy in Rome claiming to be the Vicar of Christ. However, their attitudes demonstrate that they think such a claim is a fraud. The extent of their current role in the Church is to usurp the Magisterium's role and proclaim dogmas of their own.

When you get down to brass tacks, the highest of these dogmas, the one from which all others flow, is that the Pope is not who he claims to be. He's really just a guy in a funny hat who gets to talk from a balcony, and a lot of people show up to listen.

How is this different from the "traditionalist" sedes? Why do we treat them differently?