It’s a political truism that presidential party platforms are only useful for two reasons — to pacify the fringe elements lest they become disruptive during the convention proper, or to provide material for the other side’s oppo research teams. From the reports I’ve seen, so far the DNC has achieved the first goal, and the …
Late Night Cast-A-Cold-Eye Thread: Monitoring the GOP PlatformPost + Comments (64)
An amendment offered by the Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins in the subcommittee on healthcare, education, and crime offered support for the controversial practice of “conversion therapy” for children who identify as LGBT…
An amendment that sought to argue that gay marriage “subverts child’s rights to biological parent” drew condemnation from the moderate members, including an audible gasp of, “Hello, what was that?” The committee also considered an amendment calling for allowing the teaching of the Bible as part of American History, which failed before the full group…
An aide to Donald Trump, Michael Biundo, was in the room as the subcommittee met, but didn’t offer any guidance or input. Perkins told reporters that Trump’s campaign was allowing the committee to work autonomously, calling it a break from the practice of previous presumptive nominees who have been more invested in the platform discussions…
Trump’s only interest in all the many pages of earnest minutiae that will be finalized tomorrow afternoon will be if some hapless intern set to scouring the documents finds a catchphrase that attracts Lord Short Thumb’s mayfly attention. But it should be very, very helpful to the people writing attack ads for HRClinton… and somewhat terrifying for the rest of us, as a glimpse into the narrow little minds running one of the only two national political parties we have…
Fun times here at the RNC platform meeting where delegates are debating the merits of prohibiting the use of food stamps to buy junk food.
— Molly Ball (@mollyesque) July 11, 2016
GOP platform committee now debating what "junk food" is. oreos vs chocolate covered oreos. Seriously.
— Zeke Miller (@ZekeJMiller) July 11, 2016
At GOP Platform cmte, Andy Puzder, CEO of Carl's Jr & Hardees, comes out against forbidding welfare benefits from being used on junk food .
— Reid J. Epstein (@reidepstein) July 11, 2016
Update: the amendment was defeated. The GOP takes no position on food stamps & junk food. https://t.co/5wm5CDWcYg
— Molly Ball (@mollyesque) July 11, 2016
Now debating whether states should get to approve national monument/park designations, likely inspired by this https://t.co/WPCuvmTbUV
— Molly Ball (@mollyesque) July 11, 2016
Notable: Platform committee adopts language forcing federal gov't to hand over public lands to the states.
— Ed O'Keefe (@edatpost) July 11, 2016
https://t.co/5zj94H4Hee RT @mollyesque: Added to GOP platform: “The Endangered Species Act should not include species such as grey wolves."
— Jamison Foser (@jamisonfoser) July 11, 2016
Prairie chicken/sage grouse amendment passes, so the GOP is now officially the anti-chicken party.
— Molly Ball (@mollyesque) July 11, 2016
The Republican platform can say coal is clean–or Pepsi is healthy, or Trump's fingers are huge–but that doesn't make it so.
— Michael Grunwald (@MikeGrunwald) July 11, 2016
RNC delegate: “All of the mass killings that have taken place, they’re young boys from divorced families and they’re all smoking pot."
— Molly Ball (@mollyesque) July 11, 2016
Now the GOP is debating whether requiring background checks for private school teachers is an infringement of liberty.
— Molly Ball (@mollyesque) July 11, 2016
Here’s the GOP platform plank that commits the party to protecting against magnetic pulse attacks pic.twitter.com/KXX8zdcYCA
— daveweigel (@daveweigel) July 11, 2016
(Newt Gingrich, Glenn Beck, and Alex ‘Infowars’ Jones all agree this is an underreported threat…)