Novak: Bush employing platform shoos to keep party in line

[kskiska]

With the Republican National Convention's platform committee convening in New York less than three weeks from now, no draft platform exists, no subcommittees have been named, and no special lodging for committee members has been assigned. Rather than signifying sudden collapse of accustomed Republican efficiency, all this looks more like a coolly calculated plan.

The suspicion has grown that President Bush's re-election strategists -- Karl Rove and Karen Hughes -- do not want the open debate over principles and policy that has characterized Republican platform-making for a generation. The carefully guarded Bush campaign game plan is to present delegates on the platform committee with an unpleasant surprise when they arrive in New York: a trimmed down document with virtually no time to debate it.

(snip)

The Democrats at least went through the charade of an open drafting committee session, which was totally controlled by the Kerry campaign. But the Bush campaign appears to be readying the platform committee with a fait accompli. If they are given the antiseptic document that appears likely, an explosion may occur in New York.

(snip)

What the Bush campaign seems to be building is what one veteran GOP operative told us is ''the antithesis of traditional Republican platforms. After all, when you're proud of your positions, and confident of their rightness, you want to explain them. When you're afraid to talk about them, well . . .''

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http://www.suntimes.com/output/novak/cst-edt-novak05.html

[MallRat]

1. If NOVAK is saying this, they must be in trouble.

:-)

[Old and In the Way]

2. Short and Sweet.

"Whatever our Maximum Leader Who Benevolently Protects Us, as a Father Protects His Children, says it is."

Actually, if one compares the 2000 Platform to Bush's actions, it is a joke. They really don't stand for anything anymore.

[Catfight]

4. Easy, "We stand for tax breaks to rich people and huge deficits."

I don't see why you say they don't have a platform, it's the exact opposite of Democrats.

Democrats=pro environment
Repugs=pro pollution

Democrats=pro-choice
Repugs=pro-oppression

Democrats= Surplus
Repugs= deficits

Democrats=war as a last resort
Repugs=pre-emptive war

Democrats=show up to funerals
Repugs=ignore the dead

Democrats=equality for all citizens
Repug= equality to only white rich men

Democrats=separation of church and state
Repugs= Christianity rules

Democrats=keep jobs in America
Repugs=send jobs overseas

Democrats=education for everyone
Repugs=educate only the rich


and on and on......

[starroute]

3. Too scared of their own wingnuts and fundies

All signs are that the Republican strategy for this campaign is to keep anybody from finding out what the Republican Party actually stands for. If they actually had an open platform process, it might end up calling for the criminalization of homosexuality or declaring America a Christian nation. And they can't afford to have the word get out this soon.

If the Democrats kept a lid on their own platform debates, it was to avoid divisiveness. If the Republicans do it, it's to hid their evil plans.