This looks familiar:

One candidate resigned the Missouri governorship in disgrace, facing criminal charges and allegations that an extramarital affair had turned violent.

Another, an Alabama congressman, served as President Donald Trump’s warm-up act for the “Stop the Steal” rally that preceded the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, urging participants to “start taking down names and kicking ass.”

A third recently had his Twitter account temporarily suspended when the Ohio hopeful referred to some of the people crossing the southern border as “Muslim Terrorists” and “Mexican Gangbangers.”
And that could be just the beginning.

Mike DeBonis of the Washington Post is referring to Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate in 2022. The Missouri ex-governor is Eric Greitens who is most famous for an incident of dungeon rape. The U.S. Representative from Alabama is Mo Brooks who is rapidly making us all forget about Rep. Steve King of Iowa who was so racist that he was stripped of all his committee assignment and defeated in a Republican primary. The Ohio candidate is former state treasurer Josh Mandel, a COVID-19 vaccine and election fraud truther who is a darling of the Trumpian right.

The point of DeBonis’s piece is that lunatic candidates are giving the Republican Party headaches. But maybe these lunatic candidates not so much:

Several GOP operatives, speaking on the condition of anonymity to candidly describe internal thinking, said the emerging field of Republican candidates is raising concerns, although they believe the issue is manageable since Brooks, Greitens and Mandel are running in favorable states for Republicans.

To be clear, then, the GOP insider view is that Greitens, Brooks and Mandel are probably electable. They’re most likely “manageable” headaches. A problem only arises in realistically contested races. Maybe running Lara Trump for Senate in North Carolina is a bridge too far. Perhaps Kelli Ward has established herself as a shitty candidate in Arizona. If the Republicans aren’t careful they could blow any chance to retain Pat Toomey’s Pennsylvania seat in the Senate.

I’d remind people, first of all, that Democrat Sherrod Brown keeps finding a way to get reelected in Ohio, so I wouldn’t pencil Josh Mandel in as a winner just yet. On the overall point, I’d agree that almost any Republican can win in Missouri or Alabama, but we’ve seen counterexamples. Missouri’s Claire McCaskill beat the “legitimate rape” guy in 2012 and Alabama’s Doug Jones beat a child molester in 2017. Hell, Kansas has Democratic governor thanks to the horrible record of Sam Brownback and the ridiculous candidate the GOP put up to succeed him.

What makes me sick is the attitude of these GOP operatives. Why would you want lunatics to win? Why are looking at these candidates like “manageable” problems? There are Democrats I absolutely do not want to win primaries and do not want to serve in the U.S. Senate. I don’t look at people like Anthony Weiner or Alan Grayson as problems I can live with but as threats to everything I value and believe in. Sure, they were both brilliant at exciting the base, but that’s the problem. That’s what made them dangerous.

At a certain point, I’d leave a party that kept nominating unethical and unhinged candidates. I certainly wouldn’t quietly root for those candidates on some theory that it’s for the greater good. I never shy away from telling progressives things they don’t want to hear, and I don’t do it because I don’t like progressives. I do it because it’s basic housekeeping. The Republicans should try it.