The chairperson of the state’s Republican Party made a step in the right direction on Tuesday when she upbraided one of the party’s candidates for his venomous, anti-gay rhetoric inspired by the new leader of the national GOP, Donald Trump. The candidate, Ted Busiek, who is running against incumbent progressive Democrat Jamie Eldridge, tweeted out support for Trump and linked to a 1993 video of the mogul turned GOP standard-bearer.

“DONALD TRUMP. Putting self-righteous faggots in their place since 1993. How I love this fellow,” Busiek wrote.

According to the State House News Service, Eldridge quickly flagged the outrageous tweet and “called on the Republican Party to disavow Busiek’s remarks and said the candidate should apologize and consider dropping out.”

Instead, Busiek doubled down, went further on the attack, but somehow claimed to have no “enmity” for gay people.

On Tuesday, Kirsten Hughes— who heads up the state GOP, issued a statement that read, “Obviously, Mr. Busiek’s language is completely unacceptable and does not reflect the values of the Republican Party.”

That’s a good start, and while it would be a stretch for Hughes or the state party’s nominal leader Gov. Charlie Baker to come out in support of a Democratic candidate, it’s not too much to ask that they purge this particular candidate from their ranks. The GOP should tell Busiek to pull himself from the ballot and if he won’t, they should issue a statement that makes it clear that he does not have their support in the fall election.

The demise of the GOP has been troubling to many moderates on both sides of the divide who’ve watched the party devolve over the last year thanks to the debacle that is Trumpism. Local GOP officials are going to have to go to greater lengths to stave off this strain of radical, hate-fueled conservatism and begin what could be a long process of rebuilding credibility in the GOP brand.

There’s not much they can do about the loud-mouthed baffoon who’s muscled his way to their presidential nomination, other than ignore him and wait for the inevitable crash and burn. But, in the meantime, they need to be swift in batting down the copycat morons on their turf. This small-minded bully from Littleton is a good place to start.

McDonough retires from Reporter duties

Last December, we told our readers that our longtime columnist and friend Barbara McDonough was scaling back her role at the Reporter after 33 years with the newspaper. Barbara has continued to file occasional View from Pope’s Hill dispatches since that time and has continued to compile her weekly feature “Bubbles’s Birthdays and Special Occasions”— a staple of the Reporter since our earliest days in 1983.

Last week, Barbara, 81, made the tough decision to stop compiling and writing columns altogether. This is the first edition of the Reporter in 33 years — our inception— to not carry a column or news written by Barbara.

Barbara and her husband Vinnie will always be a part of the Reporter family.