Would you like to hear about a bright ray of political sunshine penetrating the dense political cloud cover?

The Republican Party has long been haunted by the specter of platform infidelity on the part of the party’s elected officeholders. Far too often, a Republican candidate fervently vows fidelity to the party platform during a campaign but, once elected, sheds this fervor like a duck sheds water. The officeholder’s primary agenda becomes re-election, and his/her stance on issues is determined by its probable effect on re-election rather than advancing platform values.

So many Republican officeholders have displayed such a high rate of platform infidelity that a new term has been coined to describe them: “RINO,” aka “Republican in Name Only.”

However, party loyalty is a two-way street. Infidelity is a game two can play. An elected officeholder may, by his/her infidelity to the party, induce voter infidelity, too—and that’s what happened in Colorado Springs, Colorado. This past November, for the first time ever in that rare conservative redoubt of a very blue state, an independent was elected mayor.

Now, something similar is afoot in Idaho.

Image: YouTube screen grab.

At the June 2023 Idaho GOP summer meeting, the state GOP central committee adopted a platform-enforcement rule authorizing the state and local central committees “to call into question the conduct of a Republican official” regarding fidelity to the party platform or the state and federal constitutions.

Here’s section 3 of Article 20 of the newly-revised platform:

Section 3: The Idaho Republican State Central Committee, Legislative District Committees, and County Central Committees are hereby empowered to call into question the conduct of a Republican elected official; give fair consideration to alleged violations and provide a meaningful opportunity for the official to be heard...

Upon receiving a petition, the central committees must schedule a meeting to hear the alleged violations and allow the GOP official to respond. A majority of the committee can then vote to censure the official. Subsequent censures with a 60% majority would “remove Party support and prohibit the use of Republican Party identifiers on campaign information and advertising” during the individual’s current term and any other campaigns for five years.

Almost immediately, using this authority, Bonneville County’s Legislative District 32 censured three Republican legislators for platform infidelity.

The censured politicians made their sentiments known in the opinion pages of the two Idaho Falls newspapers, the East Idaho News and the Post Register. Strikingly, they did not even attempt to defend their actions. Instead, they objected to the party’s chutzpa in attempting to enforce the platform.

One can feel their pain as Idaho RINOs suddenly realize they are sailing too close to the wind. Who would ever have thought that lowly party plebeians would ever insist on patrician fidelity to the party platform? The nerve of these little people!

What these politicians do not grasp is that a political party is a private association of citizens banding together to bring their views to the attention of their elected officials. Their views are summarized in their party platform. If the party platform were not enforced, there would be no reason to have a party.

How refreshing to see rank-and-file Republicans rear up on their hind legs and snarl at their betters.