Yesterday, R. Clarke Cooper of the Log Cabin Republicans told BuzzFeed’s Chris Geidner that the platform-drafting committee of the Republican National Committee had approved adding the following words to the party’s 2012 platform: “We embrace the principle that all Americans have the right to be treated with dignity and respect.” These generic, non-specific words were characterized as some kind of nebulous nod to the LGBT community, an olive branch of sorts.

tony perkins 150x150 GOP Platform Will Be Anti Gay After AllAs I predicted, that delusion didn’t last long: last evening, BuzzFeed reported that while the “dignity and respect” reference survives for now, the Republican Party subcommittees also approved adding a plank that strongly opposes the freedom to marry for same-sex couples. Unlike the “dignity and respect” plank, which makes absolutely no specific reference to LGBT people whatsoever, the words of the anti-equality plank are veeeeeery specific. And social conservatives are crowing. Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council — a Southern Poverty Law Center-certified anti-gay hate group — even boasted to BuzzFeed that he wrote the pro-marriage discrimination plank himself:

Family Research Council president Tony Perkins told BuzzFeed: “You should read the entire plank on marriage, which I wrote. I feel very happy about it. I feel pretty optimistic about the outcome here.”

Calling out “an activist judiciary,” the draft document blasts “court-ordered redefinition of marriage” before taking on the Obama administration.

“We oppose the Administration’s open defiance of this principle [of separation of powers] — in its handling of immigration cases, in federal personnel benefits, in allowing a same-sex marriage at a military base, and in refusing to defend DOMA in the courts,” the draft states.

Finally, after praising the benefits of marriage, the draft documents state, “[W]e believe that marriage, the union of one man and one woman must be upheld as the national standard, a goal to stand for, encourage, and promote through laws governing marriage.”

So much for that olive branch.

Jerame Davis, Executive Director of the National Stonewall Democrats, responded:

“The Republican establishment is not mincing words – they wanted everyone to know they’re still the party for homophobes and hate mongers. By allowing Tony Perkins, the leader of a designated anti-gay hate group, to draft this heinous language, the GOP has sent a clear message to gay Republicans that their hope of a pro-equality Republican Party is nothing more than a pipe dream.”