Looking at the GOP's platform...

[mprotsenko]

There is popular ideological dispute - which platform is better? Democratic or Republican? Which values, which ideas are more relevant?

Well, today I learned that this dispute is moot. There is no Republican platform. I am not kidding. Last Republican convention wasn't able to decide/vote for one.

The Link that says "Learn more about our Platform" leads to the Republican party rules (that is, how to elect committee members), not the platform (positions and ideas). Bait-and-switch.

(Trump also didn't have any platform for his re-election bid, but in his case the expectations were low to begin with.)



The conclusion is simple - the word Republican has no meaning now. What kind of common ideas do you represent if you call yourself a Republican? Being hawkish with Moscow? Being friends with Putin? Freedom of business? Regulating business? Decreasing taxes? Increasing taxes (preferably for blue states, of course, but still)? Individual freedoms? Banning books and regulating bodily autonomy?

Being a Republican now means all that and more - that is, it means nothing. I cannot fix it. Democrats and independents cannot fix it. Only Republicans can do it.

Will they? Your guess is as good as mine.

Comments

[tijd]

"I have the most deep conviction that a political party can be called such only if its whole purposes are soundly based in some moral and spiritual values <...> if a political party does not have its foundation in the determination to advance a cause that is right and that is moral, then it is not a political party; it is merely a conspiracy to seize power."
https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-fourth-annual-republican-women-s-national-conference

[malyj_gorgan]

Не дивно, що кілька людей серед моїх вчителів і старших друзів, чия система поглядів виглядає мені найбільш вартою уваги, називали себе "Eisenhower Republicans"

[tijd]

It is good to remember that Eisenhower was losing the Republican primaries in 1952 to Robert Taft, an anti-NATO isolationist https://www.ourcampaigns.com/RaceDetail.html?RaceID=55194

If not for manipulations by the "establishment" at the Republican convention, he wouldn’t have won the nomination: "the convention was among the most bitter and emotional in American history" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1952_United_States_presidential_election

[malyj_gorgan]

I heard only a little about it before, the whole story is fascinating, thanks