Crackpottery on parade today.
First up, Col. Conrad Reynolds (Army, ret.) of Conway, an unsuccessful candidate for Congress in 2014, is running to unseat Republican Rep. French Hill in the 2nd District Congress primary.
It appears he formally announced first on Conspiracy Central, the Doc Washburn show. But he’s all over Facebook, has a website and also has plenty to say.
His Facebook page cheers the acquittal of multiple killer Kyle Rittenhouse, people who yell at school boards and the lying predator who previously occupied the White House. He derides CNN, COVID vaccines and immigrants from the south. He notes French Hill’s affinity for the banking industry (this isn’t nutty). In a campaign video, he says Hills hasn’t delivered on debt reduction or a border wall or much of anything. Hill is a Republican turning his back on voters, Reynolds says.
Then there’s Chris Bequette, who’s running for lieutenant governor. Typical jab of his extremist rhetoric on Twitter last night in a response to AP’s Andrew DeMillo saying he was going to run in the Little Rock Marathon.
Good luck. Hope you don’t get shot while running around the crime capitol of Arkansas, aka the “Chicago of the South”. #LRCrime #Crime #arpx #argop #arleg #ARnews #UniteLR https://t.co/gqJc9e7lxE pic.twitter.com/V3A5oA9Llr
— Chris Bequette for Lt. Governor (@ChrisBequetteAR) November 20, 2021
If Bequette is serious, you wonder why he wants to run for a job that requires him to be in Little Rock a few months to preside over the Senate.
Bequette, if you don’t remember, is the standout in a zany field of Republican lieutenant governor candidates. By his lights, Jason Rapert is a RINO.
He is not to be confused with his nephew Jake Bequette, who’s mounting a well-funded far-right challenge of Republican Sen. John Boozman in the primary, who the younger Bequette sees as yet another Republican-in-name-only for not being suitably supportive of the Trump-driven effort to overturn Joe Biden’s election.
The temptation is to call them crackpots and ignore them. But what if they are an accurate measure of the Arkansas Republican voter?