No, really — did Georgia’s Democratic Party do anything to vet their Senate runoff nominee? Republicans certainly did, and their oppo-research drops continue as early voting opens in the contest. Yesterday, the Free Beacon put this demagogic nugget from Raphael Warnock out, in which the preacher tells his congregation that Republicans are “gangsters and thugs” for, er … passing the 2017 tax-cut package.

For one brief, shining moment, the self-proclaimed “pro-choice pastor” felt concern for the “yet unborn,” however:

“While others were sleeping, members of the United States Senate declared war, launched a vicious and evil attack on the most vulnerable people in America,” said Warnock. “Herod is on the loose. Herod is a cynical politician, who’s willing to kill children and kill the children’s health program in order to preserve his own wealth and his own power.”

Herod the Great was the Judean king who attempted to kill the infant Jesus by ordering the mass slaughter of Jewish babies in Bethlehem, according to the New Testament.

Warnock continued, “On Friday night, the United States Senate decided by a slim majority to pick the pockets of the poor, the sick, the old, and the yet unborn in order to line the pockets of the ultra-rich. Don’t tell me about gangsters and thugs on the streets, there are more gangsters and thugs in Washington, D.C., in the Capitol than there are—a bunch of them.”

Well, what’s worse? Picking the pockets of the “yet unborn,” or just snuffing them out by the hundreds of thousands every year? That might be a good question for the “pro-choice pastor” to answer, especially if he’s making allusions to Herod’s massacre of the innocents. After all, it’s not Republicans who ally with Planned Parenthood and their marketing for abortion as a way to improve economic prospects for expectant mothers. Perhaps Warnock can elaborate on the Moloch cult and how well that turned out in the scriptures.

Don’t expect consistency from Warnock, either politically or theologically. Four years before proclaiming Republicans as “gangsters and thugs” for allowing Americans to keep a little bit more of their own money, Warnock had much nicer things to say about fanatical anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan. He told a questioner at a Q&A that the Nation of Islam has been important for “the development of black theology,” approvingly referencing Farrakhan’s condemnation of Christianity as a “slave religion.”

“We’ve needed the witness of the Nation of Islam,” Warnock insisted (via Townhall’s Beth Baumann):

“Its voice has been important even for the development of Black theology because it was the Black Muslims who challenged Black preachers and said, ‘You’re promulgating … the White man’s religion. That’s a slave religion. You’re telling people to focus on Heaven; meanwhile, they’re catching hell,'” Warnock explained. “We’ve needed the witness of the Nation of Islam, in a real sense, to put a fire under us and keep us honest about the meaning of the proclamation coming from our pulpits.”

What part of the Nation of Islam did Warnock need for theological development in Christianity? The part where Farrakhan refers to Jews as “termites”? As for Christianity being a slave religion, slavery takes place to this day, but not in Christian countries. Perhaps Warnock could look into that, too.

At any rate, it’s becoming more clear by the day that Warnock’s pose as a moderate Democrat is nothing but a lie. Moderates do not need Louis Farrakhan to shape their world view, theologically or politically. The fact that Warnock was defending Farrakhan in both contexts as late as 2013 (if not later) is clear evidence that Warnock is a radical demagogue, and a dangerous one at that. If Democrats want to keep wrapping their arms around Warnock, it will likely turn out very badly for them in Georgia … if not beyond.

One last thought: When will the media demand to know if Jon Ossoff and Joe Biden endorse these thoughts? We’re all playing by the media’s Todd Akin rules, right? Oh, wait ….