Speaking of holding office while having a history of extremist views:

Good old Senator Byrd, a respected pillar of the Democratic Party and former Ku Klux Klan supporter. Has the amazing ability, possessed only by liberals, of using the term "nigger" freely without fear of repercussion. Unfortunate conservatives or Republicans who let the word slip past their lips are flayed alive and dragged across the Utah Salt Flats behind teams of wild horses.

Of course, the Democratic Party, the southern contingent of which was the solid bulwark of southern racism and the main barrier to civil rights not too many years ago, has gotten a complete pass on this, to the point where many people actually now believe that the main obstacle to civil rights in the '60s was the Republican Party.