"Well I don't agree with anything he ever said or did but by jingo I respect him as a person"

Reminds me of Marx's 6th thesis on Feuerbach: "the essence of man is no abstraction inherent in each single individual. In reality, it is the ensemble of the social relations." Actions and beliefs are secondary and only incidentally attributed to individuals who, in themselves, can be good or bad even if the entirety of their existence negates it.