The new platform softened language on abortion, excised old language referring obliquely to gay conversion therapy and culled a section about reducing a national debt that Mr. Trump had increased by nearly $8 trillion during his term in office.

Mr. Trump made clear to his team that he wanted the 2024 platform to be his and his alone. He wanted it to be much shorter and simpler — and, in some cases, vaguer. He was especially focused on the language about abortion, which he recognized was a potentially potent issue against him in a general election. He wanted nothing in the platform that would give Democrats an opening to attack him, and he made clear to aides that he was perfectly fine with bucking social conservatives, for whom he had delivered a tremendous victory by reshaping the Supreme Court with a conservative supermajority.

Mr. Trump also stressed that he did not want to define marriage as between one man and one woman. Instead, the document contains a vague statement open to interpretation: “Republicans will promote a Culture that values the Sanctity of Marriage.”

One person involved in the process recalled Mr. Trump saying privately: “Sanctity of marriage. Don’t define it.”

[–] nekandro@lemmy.ml 12 points 3 months ago (2 children)

This is a huge paradigm shift. The Republican party went from being an evangelical Christian, tax-cut whackoparty into...

well, without the platform, nobody knows.

[–] sprack@lemmy.world 14 points 3 months ago (1 children)

It’s just a change to be vague about polarizing topics to attract voters. There is zero accountability for campaign promises.

[–] nekandro@lemmy.ml 0 points 3 months ago (1 children)

The lack of promises with regards to abortion and same-sex marriage is huge. It's a colossal shift. Trump has always been more of a traditional Jeffersonian Republican than a Federalist - he's in favour of shifting power from the federal government to the states. This is an increasing indicator that the states will be what decides on these social topics, not the feds.

That also explains why he's getting so much funding and support from the elite in Silicon Valley - they would like nothing more than for California to decide legislation rather than DC.

It's increasingly apparent that Trump views the role of the federal government as an arbiter of the economy and the role of the United States (as a concept) as a way of unifying the disparate interests of different states with regards to foreign policy. By gutting federal agencies, the only logical result is pushing power down to the individual states.

[–] idiomaddict@feddit.de 6 points 3 months ago (1 children)

I think you’ve put more thought into his policies than he has

[–] nekandro@lemmy.ml -3 points 3 months ago (1 children)

You can't make it to lead an American political party without being at least one standard deviation smarter than the average American.

[–] idiomaddict@feddit.de 2 points 3 months ago

What evidence do you have of that?

[–] MelodiousFunk@slrpnk.net 12 points 3 months ago (1 children)

The Republican party went from being an evangelical Christian, tax-cut whackoparty into...

A vague blank slate that people can project their hopes onto with no accountability whatsoever.

[–] nekandro@lemmy.ml 2 points 3 months ago

I mean, yeah. It'll be interesting to see if that means that they'll still pursue those legislative ideals (just without a platform or unifying cry or whatever), or if they're happy to push the responsibility down to the states.

My opinion is that the Republicans see the writing on the wall: why make unpopular decisions federally when you can make popular decisions at the state-level? They can maintain a christofascist state in their home ground without having to project onto states that'll ignore their legislation anyway.

[–] Delusional@lemmy.world 5 points 3 months ago

So he wants to enact shitty awful terrible ideas still but he doesn't want everyone to know he'll enact those shitty ideas that no one likes.

I don't think America can last another presidency of this braindead moron.

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 1 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Can someone explain the whole US national debt thing? It's impossible to get out of this debt andwhen govt needs money it should just be equivalent to printing money, which wouldn't be debt? Is this an artifact of the federal reserve being outside the government?

[–] omega_x3@lemmy.world 0 points 3 months ago (1 children)

If the government just prints a bunch of money to pay off their debit then each dollar is worth less than before. Plenty of countries have done it and almost always results in hyperinflation. The simple way to understand this is say, everyone has a dollar so very few things will cost more than a dollar, but if you started handing everyone $100 bills then people will see the value of a single dollar as being lower and start charging more for their goods and services. There are other things that go into hyperinflation but this is the explain like I'm 5 answer.

Now the government is basically paying its bills with a credit card and businesses and other countries own the debt betting that the US will keep paying towards its debt plus interest. If the government stops paying then fewer countries and businesses will be willing to offer credit. And once you run out credit then you have to start printing more money instead of adding more debt.

[–] ryannathans@aussie.zone 1 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago)

Debt causes inflation, low interest rates are how we got into this inflationary situation.

Debt is literally printing money but you owe someone. The government could print and destroy money as required without owing some random banker.

Since covid there has been zero fractional reserve required for lenders. Literally printing money would be better for everyone.

[–] Tikiporch@lemmy.world 11 points 3 months ago

The platform is to say whatever it takes to the people in front of him at any given moment so they vote for him.