The Lead

John Danforth, who sat in the U.S. Senate for two decades on behalf of Missouri, and who was also an ambassador to the U.N., counts his priestly ordination to The Episcopal Church among his bona fides. Though a Republican, he's recognizable to the Stewart-Colbert crowd for rankling the ranks of the GOP on occasion.

Danforth says the gaggle of Republicans running for president right now is mortifying.

I’ve been watching some of these Republican debates and they’re just terrible. Terrible.

... he said on KTRS's McGraw Show on Wednesday.

What have been the big applause lines in these debates? Well, a statement that the governor of Texas is responsible for killing 234 people on death row. Or that we favor torture. Or that we’re creating a fence on the Mexican border that electrocutes people when they try to cross it. Or when people show up at the emergency room at hospitals and they’re not insured don’t treat them. And that, I mean these are the big applause lines, people just hoop and holler when they hear all that.
It doesn’t have anything to do with the republican party that I was a part of. This is just totally different. And all of these people who are saying this, y’know, and claiming that, y’know, they’re for all this stuff, they also sort of ostentatiously say, “Oh, we’re very religious people. We really, we’re just very pious, Christian people.” They were for torture, and electrocution of the people on along the border and all of that. That doesn’t have anything to do with, is contrary to the Christianity that I understand.

A year ago, Danforth, in consideration of the defeat of Richard Luger, suggested the influence of the Tea Party was pushing Republicans "so far overboard [as to be] beyond redemption."

h/t Think Progress

Comments (8)

This is the type of Republican I could respect, work with, and with whom I could find common ground. Please God that there are more like this out there.

Posted by Peter Pearson | December 4, 2011 2:40 PM

The number of Republicans for whom I had respect were once legion, but, alas, no more.

June Butler

Posted by GrandmèreMimi | December 4, 2011 4:03 PM

For decades while Rush Limbaugh was in a alcohol- or drug-induced stupor, men like Danforth or Lugar or Alan Simpson were carrying the water for the Republican Party.

But then Limbaugh comes along and calls them "RINOS" (Republicans In Name Only), and a Tea Partier is christened God's Elect to run against them. Kaput.

It's really sad (said the lifelong Democrat).

JC Fisher

Posted by tgflux | December 4, 2011 9:01 PM

Those of us who actually live in Missouri know that John Danforth comes from an extremely wealthy local family and has had exactly one principled stand in his entire public career, his fierce support of Clarence Thomas. The rest of the time, he was a decaffeinated Democrat whose sucking up to the secular left has picked up considerable speed since he left the Senate.

Posted by Christopher Johnson | December 4, 2011 9:02 PM

Given that John Danforth was largely responsible for getting Clarence Thomas confirmed to the Supreme Court, I find this a bit "too little, too late," and sorely lacking in any recognition or acknowledgment of his own complicity in the current situation....

Posted by Paige Baker | December 4, 2011 9:17 PM

Paige, as the person who posted this item, I guess I need to admit that I'm a little lacking in my history here. I was in college when the Clarence Thomas thing hit, and though we had robust conversation about it, we were certainly not privileged to understand the inner machinations. So tell us what we need to know so we won't be "too little, too late."

Torey Lightcap

Posted by www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=560747865 | December 4, 2011 9:47 PM

Torey--Danforth and Thomas were old friends and colleagues. Because of this, and because of his status as an ordained Episcopal priest, Danforth was chosen to shepherd Thomas through the confirmation hearings. He and his team did everything possible to destroy Anita Hill's credibility, in order to get a "true conservative" on the court.

Clarence Thomas has voted in the majority on every major case that has created the crazy situation in which we now find ourselves: Bush v. Gore and (especially) Citizens United v. The Federal Election Commission are two that come to mind.

Without Danforth's support, Thomas would never have been confirmed. It is an open question as to whether or not another choice would have voted the same way that Thomas has—but the fact remains....Thomas has had a significant role in helping to create a climate in which the most extreme elements of the right are dominating the public discussion.

Danforth made that possible. Personally, I would welcome some acknowledgment from him that he is accountable for some of what is now going on.

Posted by Paige Baker | December 4, 2011 11:46 PM

sucking up to the secular left

You say that like it's a bad thing?

;-/

Posted by tgflux | December 5, 2011 12:53 AM

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