Ordinarily an event like former Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-CO) jumping into the Colorado governor’s race would be cause for celebration at TPM HQ. Not just because it makes for a good story in which The Crazy comes into full bloom, although, yes, that’s a self-interested part of it. But we also subscribe to the theory that The Crazy is diminished by its exposure to the sunlight and the cleansing effect of public scrutiny and mockery.
Here’s the thing though. The virulent nativism Tancredo represents scares me, and as we all know, there is a deep and wide stream of that kind of nativism that runs through American history and persists today. The thought of him as governor of a state, especially one with a 20% Hispanic population, is too sobering for me to fully relish the potential Crazy a Tancredo campaign might yield.
