Iowa Republican crazy goes far beyond birtherism

Iowa Republicans, taking "liberties" and "rights" into some crazy territory. I guess this helps explain Rep. Steve King, sadly. Meteor Blades touched on one aspect of the Iowa Republicans' official party platform: birtherism and investigating the non-existent ACORN. But it's so, so much crazier than just that.

For a start, they want to abolish the federal Departments of Agriculture, Education, Homeland Security, Housing and Urban Development, Health and Human Services, Energy, Interior, Labor, and Commerce. Also, TSA, FDA, ATF, EPA, National Endowment for the Arts, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Then Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are all phased out, but Social Security becomes a voluntary program, immediately. And of course the U.S. has to leave the United Nations, because it's nothing but a big conspiracy for one world government, particularly when it comes to agriculture and Agenda 21, the UN's global sustainable development campaign.

We demand that the term 'sustainable development' be defined, vetted, and controlled by county and state agricultural agencies whose private property it impacts rather than the UN, other international or Agenda 21 agencies, or any federal organization.

That goes for the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, too. That's all a conspiracy to take control of families away from parents, so it must not be ratified. This gem is in the education section of the platform, where we find that Iowa Republicans do not like "government schools": "We demand that education be returned to a purely free market system." Even the state Department of Education has be diminished.

Law? Pshaw.

We disagree with Roe vs. Wade and Doe vs. Bolton as 'settled law.' Under the Tenth amendment, these Supreme Court decisions have no authority over the states

In fact, the 10th amendment, according to Iowa Republicans, means that Iowa can nullify any goddamned federal law it wants to, and ignore any Supreme Court ruling: "We support constitutional state sovereignty including nullification of federal oversteps." (Their copy of the Constitution apparently is missing a clause or two, like the Supremacy one.)

They're all for pink slime, though. "We support the continued production of lean, fine-textured beef." So they're okay with ammonia-adulterated beef, but are suspicious of that whole GMO business: "We support labeling GMO (genetically modified) crops and food products made from GMO crops as such."

That's just a smattering of the 403 policy statements or 'planks' in the proposed platform, and barely scratches the surface of the document, written after, as Ed Kilgore points out, Ron Paul supporters took over much of the party apparatus. Ed makes a good point about how national Republicans should have to answer for the crazy that is blooming within their party. "Walking those planks," he says, "would do them a world of good in coming to grips with what's happened to their party."