GOP ‘Platform’ Features Fake Lincoln Quote, Video from Russia and Ukraine

When Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich unveiled his “Contract with America” in 1994, you might have been forgiven for not engaging your dial-up modem to fact check it. But in 2022 there’s no reason why, with the search capabilities of today’s internet and the widely available cheap stock images and video, the Republican Party employed a quote from an advert and attributed it to Abraham Lincoln and used video shot in Russia and Ukraine to represent scenes of American exceptionalism.

Maybe they should have stuck with their 2020 strategy of going platform-free. Apparently, the GOP’s “Commitment to America” does not include a commitment to either accuracy or American videographers.
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Who’s Groomin’ Who? Here’s a List of Recent Top Republican Groomers, Including GOP Former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert

Former Speaker Dennis Hastert

It has become a hard and fast rule in 21st century American politics that when Republicans accuse Democrats of criminal, salacious or corrupt behavior, it’s a “tell” that they are engaged in the same behavior – and then some.

It’s called “projecting,” and Republicans have been doing it for years. According to Psychology Today, “Projection is a defense mechanism commonly used by abusers, including people with narcissistic or borderline personality disorder and addicts.” It is no surprise then that Republicans’ projection strategy was perfected during the regime of Donald Trump, the ultimate toxic narcissist.

Like psychological projection, political projection attributes the accusers’ worst impulses onto their opponents. Case in point, Republicans have recently begun parroting their small but apparently influential Qanon base by accusing Democrats of grooming children for sex. The political aim behind these smears is to scare suburban moms who voted for Obama and then Trump and then Biden to vote for GQP candidates this November and in 2024.

In spreading their lies about grooming, however, Republicans are projecting one of their most glaring character flaws onto Democrats. The unpleasant fact that they’re trying to deflects is that they are the party of rampant pedophilia. Republicans believe they can get away with this scam because they know right-wing propaganda outlets like Fox will never mention their party leaders’ record of child sex abuse – and they can count on the trusty lamestream media to ignore it. That means its up to the rest of us to get the word out.

The following list of Republican sex abusers could be a start. It includes a Republican former speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, a Republican former U.S. senator and governor of South Carolina, a Republican former congressman, a Trump campaign state chairman, Republican state legislators, a Republican judge, Republican mayors, Republican fundraisers, Republican political activists, Republican preachers and right-wing radio propagandists.

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Dear Republicans: What Entitles You to the Right to Call Yourselves ‘Patriots?’

Trump enablers

Bruce Lindner:

Dear Republicans:

You didn’t object when you heard Donald Trump say he likes to grab women “by the pussy.”

You didn’t object when he kicked the American media out of the Oval Office and handed two Russian spies classified data entrusted to him by one of our allies.

You didn’t object when he likened our intelligence community to “Nazis.”

You didn’t object when he stood before the Memorial Wall of Stars at Langley and told lie after lie about himself and the election.

You didn’t object while at the Helsinki Summit, he met behind closed doors with the Russian President.

You didn’t object to him banning the American Press from covering that meeting.

You didn’t object when he emerged from that meeting and sided with the Russian President over the findings of our own intelligence community.

You didn’t object when the Trump campaign admitted to accepting Russian offers to help him defeat Secretary of State Clinton.

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The Grand Old Party Rejects Its Past

“The GOP stands for Grand Old Party, but there is no past on display at the 2020 Republican National Convention: No previous Republican presidents, or previous Republican presidential nominees, are speaking. History, for this Republican Party, began on June 15, 2015, when Donald J. Trump descended a golden escalator. That suits both sides just fine. The Bush family, and the Republicans who admire them, view Trump and his followers with horror. In turn, Trump and his allies look upon the Bush wing of the party with contempt.”

Ezra Klein

The Real Republican Platform Is too Scary to Publish


David Frum has a brilliant piece in the Atlantic that outlines in 13 points the actual platform of the Republican Party and explains why the GOP won’t be rolling it out during its convention. It’s red meat for a minority and too scary and cynical for a majority of Americans.

The points are all discoverable in the behavior of Republican politicians and the titular head of the party — Donald Trump. We’ve seen them implemented over the past 3.5 years on the border, in the environment, on Capitol Hill, in the White House and on the Supreme Court.