A couple wayward House Republicans have walked off the reservation and rejected the ideological purity demanded by the party’s conservative base. Rep. Richard Hanna, elected in 2010 as part of the Republican takeover of Congress, lashed out at his caucus yesterday:

U.S. Rep. Richard Hanna took his own party to task today, saying the Republican Party is too willing to accommodate its most extreme members.

“I have to say that I’m frustrated by how much we — I mean the Republican Party — are willing to give deferential treatment to our extremes in this moment in history,” he told The Post-Standard editorial board [...]

Hanna, a businessman who defeated Democratic incumbent Michael Arcuri two years ago, said his first term in Congress left him “sad in a lot of ways” because of the growing divisiveness on both sides of the aisle.

“We render ourselves incapable of governing when all we do is take severe sides…” he said. “If all people do is go down there and join a team, and the team is invested in winning and you have something that looks very similar to the shirts and the skins, there’s not a lot of value there.”

Hanna is the guy who asked women to donate to Democrats back in March, because they would have a better chance of supporting people who favored women’s issues. Hanna has a difficult race in November in a reconfigured district, which could be driving some of this, but somehow I don’t think he’s much longer for the Republican caucus.

Steven LaTourette, a veteran of the Gingrich revolution in 1994, is definitely not much longer for the caucus after announcing a sudden retirement with 99 days to go until Election Day. LaTourette apparently was miffed about being passed over for a plum

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