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When party platforms cease to matter

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It became something of a running joke in 1996, when Bob Dole publicly conceded, many times, that he hadn’t even read the Republican Party’s platform. ”I have due respect for the platform,” Dole said at one point after his convention. ”I read a lot of parts that I thought were essential.”

Twelve years later, we’ve reached the point at which a presidential candidate not only won’t read his platform, but doesn’t much care what’s in it.

Jean from Ferrisburgh, Vt., wants the Republican Party to get off “the global-warming bus.” Paul from Carrollton, Texas, wants it to “reject fetal stem-cell research.” And Larry from Waynesboro

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, Pa., wants the party to promise to “deport those who are here illegally.”

Republicans are inviting suggestions for their party platform this year, and thousands have responded online. But when a committee meets to draft the document in Minneapolis next week, one voice will be largely absent: John McCain’s. […]

Instead of fighting with party activists to form the platform around his own ideas

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, Sen. McCain has taken a hands-off approach.

McCain and his party’s base disagree on a few hot-button issues, and GOP activists are intent on making sure their platform reflects their priorities. McCain’s response is to ignore the platform altogether.

Grover Norquist told the WSJ McCain is “doing the party a favor by separating the party platform and the candidate’s position. It’s a very strong, grown-up position.”

I’m not sure if that’s true, but it’s certainly a reminder of the relevance of platforms in modern politics. Ostensibly, the Republican Party’s platform and the Republican Party’s presidential nominee would be on the same page. Indeed

, from a historical perspective, voters who sought to learn more about a presidential candidate’s policy agenda would turn to the candidate’s party platform and read all about his priorities. And yet now, McCain won’t write, read, or care a whit about the platform that comes out of his own convention.

I remember working on a project in grad school that led me to read a lot of old party platforms, and it was a pretty fascinating way to watch the transitions of major parties over the decades. But at this point

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, they’re antiquated, meaningless documents. It’s probably time to scrap them altogether.

Comments

  • Diogenes

    says:

    If you’re scrapping platforms, you might as well scrap parties as well. Of course, I’d rather scrap parties and make each candidate explain their policy positions so that voters can make an informed decision about each. But I’m funny that way.

  • Andrew

    says:

    Steve, can you address the report that McCain is ahead in a national poll? What is this going to mean for November?

  • NonyNony

    says:

    Perhaps if party platforms get scrapped then party activists will start working for actual change and to extract actual meaningful promises from presidential candidates, instead of the meaninglessly symbolic “plank in the party platform”.

    That’s why I don’t expect the Dems at least to give up their platform anytime soon. Because if they didn’t have meaningless symbolism to distract some of the activists, the pols might actually have to work towards actual goals.

  • The Answer is Orange

    says:

    But when a committee meets to draft the document in Minneapolis next week, one voice will be largely absent: John McCain’s.

    Just like his approach to the Senate.

    He doesn’t need to show up. He’ll say whatever they tell him to. If people don’t like it he’ll say he never said that and how dare you call a POW a liar.

    In defense of party platforms, I hope the GOP keeps theirs. They’ve been a quick and easy way of pissing of large numbers of voters all at once. Has anyone seen the LCRs lately?

  • Lance

    says:

    Well, if John Sidney doesn’t speak for his campaign is it any wonder that his Party’s platform doesn’t speak for anything?

    Presidential Candidates have web sites to post their policies and positions. The Party can have platforms, but how many of the approximately 471 candidates for National Office for that party actually run on them? None?

    Hell, the Republican’t in Tom Davis’s old district isn’t even running as a Republican’t. You can’t see his party affliation in any of his ads.

  • Basilisc

    says:

    The biggest paradox in American politics for at least twenty years has been that voters agree with Democrats on policies, but vote Republican. Democrats have always been at a loss as to how to deal with this. But the answer has always been staring them in the face: The Republican party platform.

    Whether or not party platforms are obsolete, this year’s GOP platform should offer Obama an opening wide enough to drive a truck through. If he’s smart enough to take it.

    All he has to do is make a list of the most extreme, outrageous base-pleasing positions that are opposed by a majority of voters: on choice, on stem cells, on immigration, on Social Security. Then give a speech: “Senator, the Republican platform says x. Do you agree with x? If you do, why don’t you be straight with the American people and explain why you do? And, if you don’t, how come you can’t even get your own party to back you on something so important?”

    Make it a stark, simple campaign ad – one position after another that John McCain’s party is on the record supporting. Distribute the list to surrogates as a talking points. Bring them up in debates – over, and over, and over. Have volunteers show up at McCain rallies with platforms on their heads (and, when security throws them out, tape it and post it on YouTube). And if McCain starts saying, “that’s the party platform, not my position”, get this on tape. Get an evangelical mailing list, and e-mail McCain’s denials to everyone on it.

    Republicans win elections by creating wedge issues, then exploiting them. It’s way past time for Democrats to do the same.

  • woody, tokin librul

    says:

    …it was a pretty fascinating way to watch the transitions of major parties over the decades. But at this point, they’re antiquated, meaningless documents. It’s probably time to scrap them altogether.

    I wholly concur. It is time to scrap both “parties” in their entirety, and the [party of property of which both are sycophantic, dependent parasites…

  • Always hopeful

    says:

    “Republicans win elections by creating wedge issues, then exploiting them. It’s way past time for Democrats to do the same.”

    Amen to that!!! Republicans win elections because they play to the “average American”. Every conceivable prejudice or issue of pride the average American has, that is…They don’t even have to actually do anything for them, that’s the kicker!

  • Bernard HP Gilroy

    says:

    Andrew @ 2 :

    Steve, can you address the report that McCain is ahead in a national poll? What is this going to mean for November?

    I’m not Steve 🙂 but I have an opinion. Color me contrary, but I am not too worried. In fact, this might even be a positive. We all know the media wants — no, needs — a horse race. We have all seen that they descend like a flock of vultures on anyone deemed “the frontrunner”. Maybe, if Senator McCain is the frontrunner, we’ll see an acceleration in the recent trend toward critical coverage of his campaign…

  • JC

    says:

    Grover Norquist told the WSJ McCain is “doing the party a favor by separating the party platform and the candidate’s position. It’s a very strong, grown-up position.”

    The fact that Norquist would even say something like this (ie “grown-up position”) tells me that it is anything but a grown-up position.

  • joey(bjobotts)

    says:

    McCain doesn’t want anything in writing that he might have to go by since he is in the habit of making it up as he goes along. He has flipped on over 75 positions he previously held so it is hard enough to remember what his current position is without having to compare it with something he put in writing.

    The party of hypocrisy would rather not put it in writing. The neocons had PNAC removed from the web because of what it revealed about their plans. One only need read the republican platform form Texas to see their hypocrisy. This is the convention of the Money party more than the publicans.
    From Cafferty’s article:…..http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/08/18/cafferty.mccain/index.html

    “… Where are John McCain’s writings exploring the vexing moral issues of our time? Where are his position papers setting forth his careful consideration of foreign policy, the welfare state, education, America’s moral responsibility in the world, etc., etc., etc.?

    John McCain graduated 894th in a class of 899 at the Naval Academy at Annapolis. His father and grandfather were four star admirals in the Navy. Some have suggested that might have played a role in McCain being admitted. His academic record was awful. And it shows over and over again whenever McCain is called upon to think on his feet.

    He no longer allows reporters unfettered access to him aboard the “Straight Talk Express” for a reason. He simply makes too many mistakes. Unless he’s reciting talking points or reading from notes or a TelePrompTer, John McCain is lost. He can drop bon mots at a bowling alley or diner — short glib responses that get a chuckle, but beyond that McCain gets in over his head very quickly….”

    Read the whole thing… it’s great and spot on. Shares Bush’s intellectual curiosity…none.