34 Most Demented Things in the Texas GOP Platform

[ErikJ]

34 Most Demented Things in the Texas GOP Platform

http://www.alternet.org/tea-party-and-right/34-most-demented-things-texas-gop-platform?paging=off¤t_page=1#bookmark

July 8, 2014 |
The Texas GOP unveiled its platform recently, and it is one scary, feverish document. As Hendrik Hertzberg of the New Yorker puts it: [3]

The thing is, the Republican Party of Texas has a dream. Lots of dreams: its platform, unveiled last week, has sixteen thousand words’ worth. The road it maps is anything but royal; these good people, after all, are republicans, albeit with a capital “R.” But the document does lead to the G.O.P.’s unconscious, or part of it: its fearsome, rampaging id.

What is troubling is that, as much as we'd like to, this document can't just be dismissed as coming from some crazy outlier group. This is the official Republican party representing the state from which we got our last Republican president, is bound to run some more, and is one of the biggest states in the Union, with lots of electoral votes.

Yikes!
1. On nullification:

• The Texas Legislature should nullify—indeed, “ignore, oppose, refuse, and nullify”—federal laws it doesn’t like.........................

2. On doing away with most federal agencies:
........................

3. On not electing Senators:.....................

10-26. Here is a partial list of what the Texas GOP would like to see abolished:

• Personal-income taxes

• Property taxes

• Estate taxes

• Capital-gains taxes

• Franchise and business-income taxes

• The gift tax

• Minimum-wage laws

• Social Security (“We support an immediate and orderly transition to a system of private pensions”)

• The Environmental Protection Agency

•The Department of Education and all its functions

• “Unelected bureaucrats”

• “Any and all federal agencies not based on an enumerated power granted by the United States Federal Constitution”

• Congressional pensions

• Supreme Court jurisdiction in cases involving abortion, religious freedom, and the Bill of Rights

• The Federal Reserve

• “Foreign aid, except in cases of national defense or catastrophic disasters, with Congressional approval”

• Obamacare

27.-30. And here are some things that Texas Republicans can get behind:

• Withdrawal from the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, and the World Bank

• “Traditional methods of discipline, including corporal punishment”

• “Reducing taxpayer funding to all levels of education institutions.”

• Returning to “the time-tested precious metal standard for the United States dollar.”

.....................more

http://www.alternet.org/tea-party-and-right/34-most-demented-things-texas-gop-platform?paging=off¤t_page=1#bookmark

[DebJ]

1. The gold standard? OMG. What boobs. nt

[newfie11]

2. Sounds like a hell hole to me. Nt

[shenmue]

3. They should just say 'Everything' and leave it at that

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. The surprising one is they don't think the Supreme Court should preside over Bill of Rights cases

The rest is ultra-right lunacy, so par for the course. But that one is a direct reversal of the constitution - the part they spend so much time literally waving around and claiming was inspired by God as the most perfect form of state that could ever be. If not the Supreme Court, who do they think would be the top court? Do they think they can pray for Jesus to hand down a judgement?

[the_sly_pig]

5. el Partido Republicano de Texas es muy estúpido.

[liberal N proud]

6. Nothing about cutting anything related to WAR!

[justgamma]

7. Looks a lot like the Iowa platform. n/t

[hatrack]

8. Only 34?

I'd think soil that rich has plenty more sprouting up . . .

[Enthusiast]

9. That Social Security proposal could be used to get many Democrats elected.

Unless they adopt the Republican position.