07/10/00 - SAM FRANCIS   GOP CONSERVATIVES PLEASED WITH EXCLUSION FROM PLATFORM The Republican National Convention hasn't even convened yet, and already the party's leaders are licking their chops over selling out the GOP's conservative base and most of its principles. That, however, is not the big news. The big news is that the party's conservatives are licking their own chops over being sold out. The Washington Post reported last week that the high command of the Stupid Party is trying to make certain there are no embarrassing splits at the convention over the content of the party's platform. In years past, whenever the conservatives couldn't quite get the candidate they wanted, they usually made do with dictating what was in the platform. But that wasn't much of a problem, you see, because the party's leaders and candidates never had any intention of abiding by the platform anyway. Nevertheless, the existence of an ideologically conservative platform haunting the ticket like Banquo's ghost meant that if (usually, when) the nominee violated the platform, the conservatives could yell and scream about it and threaten to walk out. Today the Stupid Party has evolved to the stage where such primitive emotionalism no longer occurs. Today, says Platform Committee Chairman Tommy Thompson, governor of Wisconsin, "We don't want to go back and fight old fights." So what "we" are going to do is settle the platform before the convention. Conservatives will get their beloved anti- abortion plank, but just about all other conservative positions will probably plop into File 13. That seems to be OK with the conservatives, or what's left of them in the party. So obsessed have they become with the "pro-life" language of the platform, vowing support for a constitutional amendment that would ban abortion nationally, that they're willing to abandon virtually everything else. Everything else includes, among other measures: --Junking the plank, in the platform since 1980, that calls for abolishing the Department of Education; that means the fundamental conservative principle of no federal involvement in education is being surrendered; --Just to confirm the surrender, the party leaders want to insert new language calling for federally-imposed national standards for education; --The new platform will also get rid of the language inserted in 1996 calling for control of illegal immigration and reducing legal immigration; "we" can't have that when "we've got to win over all those Hispanics, you know; --Tha platform will also include what Gov. Thompson calls "a substantial section of a Republican commitment to spend money on women's health issues," as well as on a mass transit system. The purpose of all the new language, says the governor, is to put "more of a compassionate face on the Republican Party." How sweet. What the "new face" means, of course, is that the old conservatism of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan is defunct, at least within the GOP. There is no question that, despite all the Beltway conservative crowing about the "conservative revolution" they've supposedly pulled off, the new Republican platform has virtually nothing in common with the platforms of years past. The "more compassionate face" the party is adopting simply means it has surrendered serious conservatism and has gravitated into the philosophical orbit of the left. But then there's always the anti-abortion plank. Yes, but that plank has been in the platform since 1980, and there is vitually no chance whatsoever that it will be realized in the form of a constitutional amendment. Even under Ronald Reagan, a far more serious foe of abortion than George W. Bush, there was little chance for such an amendment, and Bush himself accepts abortion for rape and incest, and refuses to make opposition to it a "litmus test" for Supreme Court appointments. So far from keeping alive any serious hope of ending abortion, the platform's pro-life language simply dooms it to political oblivion by committing pro-life forces to a measure and strategy impossible to enact. Pro-lifers would be better off forgetting the amendment the platform promises and working on getting Roe v. Wade repealed and the issue returned to the states where it belongs. Indeed, pro-lifers, as well as other conservatives, might be better off forgetting about the Republican Party itself as any kind of realistic vehicle for their beliefs. Neither the party's nominee nor his henchmen want them or their ideas in the platform or the party, except as voting booth cannon fodder. Then again, if there really aren't enough conservatives left in the party to demand and get a platform that reflects their beliefs, and if the only belief they insist on is opposition to abortion, maybe what's left of the Republican right has finally gotten the party it really deserves. 07/10/00 - THE VALLEY INDEPENDENT - Joanna Blair   BUCHANAN VISITS FAMILY'S HOME TOWN Presidential candidate Pat Buchanan is no stranger to the Mon Valley. During last night's visit to the area, he reminisced about the days when he visited his grandfather, Ed Crum, of Charleroi.     "I came to the Mon Valley first right after World War II when my uncles came home from World War II and my father and mother went to the beach for a vacation," he explained. "They put their four oldest boys with my grandfather right here in Charleroi. I remember my uncles would take me down to the Mac's Club and they'd drink beer in the afternoon and let me hang around the Mac's Club." Last night Buchanan was here for another reason - he's hoping to secure the Reform Party's nomination for president of the United States.     Buchanan was asked how the Mon Valley would benefit if he were to become president. "I saw the steel mills were really working then, and I know what's happened the Mon Valley," he said. "What we will try to do is stop sending these good-paying industrial and manufacturing jobs abroad and create trade policies that can start creating jobs in manufacturing. Jobs that carry health insurance right here in the United States of America." Buchanan continued, "One of the reasons I joined the Reform Party, and I'm running against the other two parties and their candidates, is I think they've abandoned the American worker. They've abandoned the American manufacturers. They're sacrificing the country and the interest of the American families on the altar of what they call the global economy.     "I think what we need," Buchanan said, "is to start looking out for our own country and our own people first. And our people come from the Mon Valley." On other issues Buchanan discussed the Reform Party and its goal of providing an alternative to the other parties. "I believe that if we get the Reform Party nomination, which I'm confident we will, we can move ourselves up to the polls where we're in the debates," he explained. "We can yet turn this into a three-way race. That's what this election is about. No votes yet belong to anybody, the belong to the American people who are going to cast those ballots." Buchanan doesn't fear the candidacy of another alternative party candidate, Ralph Nader. He's confident of placing on the ballot in all 50 states and doesn't feel Nader's party will do as well.     Vice President Al Gore spent yesterday in Bridgeville discussing his Medicare plan, which he says will pay for prescription drugs for the elderly. Buchanan , speaking on the same subject, said, "the first thing we have to do with Medicare and Social Security is to make sure that all the benefits we've already promised are delivered before we promise any more.     "The way that Medicare and Social Security get into trouble is by promising things that they can't deliver. What we want to know is how does Mr. Gore propose to pay for the new benefits?" he said. As for the economy, while it's perceived to be good, there is trouble, Buchanan said. Underneath the surface of prosperity, factories have shut down and good-paying jobs have been shipped out of the U.S., to Mexico, Asia and China.     He said that more and more families are forced to send both parents into the work force just to pay their taxes or maintain their standard of living. That's wrong, he said.     "In 1950, my father could raise eight kids, which he had then, on a single income with his wife staying at home. I don't think you can do that today. I don't think you can buy the kind of home we had today on a single income with eight children. I don't think you can get the kind of education we got.     "Clearly there's a lot of us that are doing very well in this economy and others that are being stretched thin," he said. "What we want is a situation in America where the single income, the single spouse can support a big family." Buchanan said he's motivated to continue seeking the presidency after two earlier unsuccessful bids because his ideas are not being put forth elsewhere.     Ruth Traynor, a first cousin to Buchanan and a resident of Belle Vernon, recalled the days when Buchanan visited here as a child.     "Pat used to come back and visit quite a bit when he was young," said Traynor, a registered Democrat. "Now we correspond. We don't always agree, but we enjoy the discussion." MORE FROM THE INTERNET BRIGADE NEWSWIRE...

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