Night and day, vinegar and honey, fear and hope.
Those opposites are not just the way the Republican and Democratic parties act and talk. The 180-degree extremes also reflect the way the GOP and Democratic platforms read.
Not even Donald Trump is as shocking as the Republican platform, which in addition to making the U.S. a walled and gated community, also makes no exceptions for rape or women’s health in cases of abortion and bans abortions based on disabilities. It encourages the Bible (not religion classes – the Bible) to be taught in public high schools, calls for the selling of coal as a “clean” energy source and the opening of the Keystone Pipeline, forbids the EPA to regulate carbon dioxide, demands a return of federal lands to the states, insists that legislators use religion as a guide in lawmaking, seeks “family values” judges, bars women in the military from combat, rejects stronger gun safety controls, rejects same-sex marriage, favors states’ rights for policing bathrooms (lest a transgender person needs to use one) and champions merchants who would deny service to gays.
It could have been worse. The draft platform included language supporting gay conversion therapy.
Pundits have suggested the platform should also call for a GOP nickname change: from the Big Tent party to the “Big Wall” party.