The following editorial appeared recently in the Washington Post

When Mitt Romney ran for the Republican presidential nomination four years ago, he carried a three-legged stool to signify the unity of the three traditional elements of the party: “economic conservatives, social conservatives and defense conservatives.” The GOP, he argued, must rest on a balance of these three, which made for a more or less comfortable peace behind his candidacy.

At the Republican National Convention Monday, the party formally adopted a platform that reflects its accelerating ideological confusion — and its lurching away from the center of American politics.

The party embraced a startlingly backwardlooking social agenda, much of it a reaction to the Obergefell v. Hodges Supreme Court ruling that legalized same-sex marriage. The party favors a constitutional amendment that would overturn the ruling, enabling states to ban same-sex unions once again. It proclaims that children should be raised by “a mother and father,” expressing disapproval of gays and lesbians as parents. It signals approval for the discredited practice of gay conversion therapy. It calls for the Bible to be taught in public schools. It supports allowing churches to organize politically while keeping their tax-exempt status.

The party’s allegiance to tax cutting and deregulation remains. The GOP would curtail a variety of environmental protections and prevent a variety of species from being listed as endangered. It would abolish the Internal Revenue Service, a particularly silly bumper-sticker proposal.

Donald Trump’s takeover has moved the GOP toward isolationism, anti-trade populism and a concomitant ambivalence on essential economic freedoms. The platform says “we need better negotiated trade agreements that put America first” — which implies criticism of past trade deals that Republicans have traditionally defended.

Filling out the picture, the platform adopts Trump’s call to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, which would be an expensive (if ineffective) symbol of America shutting out the outside world.

The net result is a platform that is more reactionary than visionary, with an emphasis on social matters that is out of step with American public opinion and an isolationist turn that reeks of counterproductive nativism. Party platforms, it is often said, are irrelevant. In this case, the nation can only hope so.