THE OLD REPUBLICAN BAIT-AND-SWITCH

I'm not impressed by this:

First lady Melania Trump voiced support for LeBron James on Saturday after President Trump went after the NBA star on Twitter, questioning his intelligence....

“It looks like LeBron James is working to do good things on behalf of our next generation and just as she always has, the First Lady encourages everyone to have an open dialogue about issues facing children today," first lady spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham said in a statement obtained by The Hill.

Her comment came hours after the president jabbed James on Twitter and questioned his intelligence, prompting pushback and statements of support on the player's behalf.

Following CNN host Don Lemon's interview with James this week about his newly opened school, Trump tweeted: “Lebron James was just interviewed by the dumbest man on television, Don Lemon. He made Lebron look smart, which isn’t easy to do."

When I read about something like this, or about Ivanka Trump criticizing her father's family separation policy, I'm reminded of this GOP bait-and-switch from 2004:

In a political season marked by Republican efforts to outlaw gay marriage, Vice President Dick Cheney on Tuesday offered a defense of the rights of gay Americans, declaring that "freedom means freedom for everyone" to enter "into any kind of relationship they want to."

... In contrast, President Bush has argued that a federal constitutional amendment banning gay marriage is essential....

In unusually personal remarks on the issue, delivered at a campaign forum in Davenport, Iowa, the vice president referred to his daughter, Mary, who is a lesbian, saying that he and his wife "have a gay daughter, so it's an issue our family is very familiar with." ...

He spoke on the same day that a draft version of the Republican platform was distributed to convention delegates that declared, "We strongly support President Bush's call for a constitutional amendment that fully protects marriage." The draft platform added, "Attempts to redefine marriage in a single city or state could have serious consequences throughout the country, and anything less than a constitutional amendment, passed by Congress and ratified by the states, is vulnerable to being overturned by activist judges."

Cheney made those remarks on August 24, 2004. The Republican convention convened six days later. The platform ratified at the conventionincluded the language quoted above.

And then there were the referenda:

COLUMBUS, Ohio, Nov. 3 - Proposed state constitutional amendments banning same-sex marriage increased the turnout of socially conservative voters in many of the 11 states where the measures appeared on the ballot on Tuesday, political analysts say, providing crucial assistance to Republican candidates including President Bush in Ohio....

The amendments, which define marriage as between only a man and a woman, passed overwhelmingly in all 11 states....

But the ballot measures also appear to have acted like magnets for thousands of socially conservative voters in rural and suburban communities who might not otherwise have voted, even in this heated campaign, political analysts said. And in tight races, those voters -- who historically have leaned heavily Republican -- may have tipped the balance.

Red-meat policies for the true believers, accompanied by a toothless dissent from someone close to the president in order to fool more moderate voters. It worked in '04. No one should fall for it again.