Kevin Drum over at Calpundit has been on absolute fire of late, what with Intimigate and Arnold and what not. Today he takes a look at the Texas Republican Party’s platform.

The heart and soul of Republican grass roots activism can be found pretty easily: it’s in Texas. The New Model radical right took over the Texas Republican party a decade ago and elected George Bush governor. They have since taken over the entire state and propelled one of their own to the presidency and another to leadership of the House of Representatives. They bring a messianic fervor to their task, and after successfully taking over the second biggest state in the union their sights are now set on the entire country. This is not a fringe group. It is the biggest, most active, most energetic, and most determined segment of the Republican party today.

So it’s fair to ask, what do they really want? Not what their public face is, and not what’s politically feasible at the moment, but what are their goals? What kind of America do they want?

He proceeds to tell us by showing us the Texas Republican Party’s platform, which is seriously scary. It’s even scarier because so much of it isn’t about Texas. It’s about the nation.

These guys are in charge of the nation. This is what they want.

I’d say “God help us all” if I thought it would do any good.

And just in case you want to say, “Conspiracy theory, nobody cares about the platform, yadda yadda,” don’t forget this part of the platform:

Any person filing as a Republican candidate for a public or Party office shall be provided a current copy of the Party platform at the time of filing. The candidate shall be asked to read and initial each page of the platform and sign a statement affirming he/she has read the entire platform.

Can we name any national politicians who hail from Texas? They’ve signed off on this, people.

We’re doomed unless the vast majority of us who are not jiggy with this nonsense get angry and do something.

Dropped Sophia off at school, then drove by the polling place with Simon (who ran around while I did my thing). Got accosted by the LA Times pollster outside (first time that’s ever happened to me!) and happily filled out a questionnaire on how I voted.

I am still stunned we’re even having this stupid election. Hello, I had my chance to vote against Gray Davis last year and I did so—last year was kind of my Year of Voting Anarchically: I voted for Camejo (whose policies I agreed with the most, but usually I don’t vote for third party candidates on principle and I have a sore spot in my heart for the Greens in general), I voted for San Fernando Valley secession, I voted for Hollywood secession. Don’t remember who I voted for for Senator, other than NOT DiFi and NOT the Republican. (I’m sure that comes as a shock.)

What stuns me even more than this election is that people are actually voting for Schwarzenegger. Just in terms of policy…um, does he have one? I don’t do cult of personality voting, I don’t understand why people would just trust that “he’ll do the best for us.” WTF? His chief advisor is Pete “I make Davis look good” Wilson, which should be enough to make any thinking Californian run screaming.

I hope the kids take voting as seriously as Darin and I do. Actually, given the nonsense going on right now—you’ve all heard of Diebold, I presume?—I hope we can still vote when they’re older.