26 August—Good news for people in the 5^th Congressional District who don’t like to vote Republican but don’t want to vote for incumbent Democrat Jahana Hayes. Because according to the “Brass Tacks” sidebar in this morning’s Waterbury newspaper of record, George Logan, who is challenging Jahana, is a “former state senator and Republican.” We’re not told what party George has defected to, but at least he’s no longer a Republican. Because if you read it in the Republican-American you know it’s true.

Lingering on partisan politics, then, the usual rationale of Republicans (and others) who have nothing good to say about Donald Trump yet will vote for him is, “Vote the platform, not the person.” Democrats (and others) who have nothing good to say about Kamala Harris will pull out the same rationale. Vote the platform indeed.

But who ever bothers to really get to know party platforms? It’s a given that they’re basically PR gimmicks full of feel-good platitudes, empty promises, and other pandering poppycock, most of which isn’t taken seriously by the platforms’ authors and shouldn’t be taken seriously by anyone at all.

So that takes us to this year’s Republican and Democrat platforms. The GOP platform is essentially a novelette, comprising just about 5,000 words of same-old same-old smarmy claptrap. Here’s a convenient sample:

“To make clear our commitment, we offer to the American people the 2024 GOP Platform to Make America Great Again! It is a forward-looking Agenda that begins with the following twenty promises that we will accomplish very quickly when we win the White House and Republican Majorities in the House and Senate.”

God forbid either party should win the trifecta. In that event, we’d really be screwed. And where the hell do the Republicans—thanks to Ronald Reagan in 1980—get off even implying that America hasn’t been great? Ever.

So then take the Democrat platform. Please. It’s a ponderous novel (lots shorter than “Atlas Shrugged” but even less readable), almost nine times longer than the GOP non-seller, at over 42,000 words (about 100 pages) of pretty much the same-old same-old smarmy claptrap with what the GOP would derisively call a socialist slant. Perhaps the Dems were impressed—awed, in fact—by the sheer bulk of the almost 900-page absolutely ludicrous Project 2025, “The Conservative Promise/Mandate for Leadership” (“Atlas Shrugged” in spades) but couldn’t come up with enough incredibly scary ideas to intimidate voters, all Americans, and the world at large.

Here, then, is a sample of the Democrat platform:

“The Democratic National Committee wishes to acknowledge that we gather together to state our values on lands that have been stewarded through many centuries by the ancestors and descendants of Tribal Nations who have been here since time immemorial. We honor the communities native to this continent, and recognize that our country was built on Indigenous homelands. We pay our respects to the millions of Indigenous people throughout history who have protected our lands, waters, and animals.

“While we meet in Chicago, we also recognize and honor the traditional homelands of the Anishinaabe, also known as the Council of the Three Fires: the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations.

“We acknowledge the many other tribes who consider this area their traditional homeland, including the Myaamia, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Sac and Fox, Peoria, Kaskaskia, Wea, Kickapoo, and Mascouten.”

Any wonder the Democrat platform is so long and tedious? And unreadable.

It’s likely that even the people who authored the platforms of both parties didn’t have the patience or courage to read, copy edit, or proofread their handiwork. So some typos are to be expected. In fact, we chanced upon some minor errors in the Republican platform, like an extraneous period or similar typos here and there.

But the Democrat platform contains at least one particularly pregnant whopper in the section on Gun Safety:

“President Biden also established the first-ever White House Office of Gun Safety Prevention—led by Vice President Harris—and took nearly 40 gun safety executive actions, including going after dangerous ‘ghost guns.’ He launched new law enforcement strike forces within the Department of Justice to crack down on gun trafficking.”

You wonder why anyone at all, especially an anti-gun Democrat, would want to prevent gun safety. On the other hand, it’s the Biden-Harris administration; or, as Donald Trump is calling it, the Harris-Biden administration. As with George Logan being a former state senator and Republican, syntax counts.

So does gun safety . . .