Republican Roy Moore is the new Welch (or at least one of several new Welches). He threatens to provide conservatism’s critics with precisely the caricature they crave.

He is a twice-disgraced former judge who believes 9/11 was divine retribution for our sins and an anti-Muslim bigot who can’t quite bring himself to rule out the death penalty for homosexuals. But he won the Alabama Senate primary anyway, largely on the grounds that he was the most anti-establishment candidate. To Alabama primary voters, his extremism is apparently proof that he won’t “sell out.”

If Moore is the new Welch, Buckley and Goldwater’s heirs have rejected the mantle of opposition, at least in this case. Last week, Senators Mike Lee and Rand Paul endorsed Moore, citing his devotion to the Constitution and (in Lee’s words) his “reputation of integrity.”