CPAC follies
Salon's Michelle Goldberg chronicles the follies at the Conservative Political Action Conference.
Two highlights ...
First, Congressman Chris Cox (R - California), in his introduction of Dick Cheney, showed a certain creative license, as Goldberg explains:
"America's Operation Iraqi Freedom is still producing shock and awe, this time among the blame-America-first crowd," he crowed. Then he said, "We continue to discover biological and chemical weapons and facilities to make them inside Iraq." Apparently, most of the hundreds of people in attendance already knew about these remarkable, hitherto-unreported discoveries, because no one gasped at this startling revelation.
It's one thing for radio or television personalities to say such blatant falsities, but when Congressmen and Vice Presidents are willing to do so, it shows a politics that is dangerously corrupt and slouching towards fascism.
Goldberg expands upon its significance:
And why would they [gasp]? Like comrades celebrating the success of Mao's Great Leap Forward, attendees at CPAC, the oldest and largest right-wing conference in the country, invest their leaders with the power to defy mere reality through force of insistent rhetoric. The triumphant recent election is all the proof they need that everything George W. Bush says is true. Sure, there's skepticism of the president's wonder-working power among some of the old movement hands -- including the leaders of the American Conservative Union, which puts CPAC on. For much of the rank and file, though, the thousands of blue-blazered students and local activists who come to CPAC each year to celebrate the völkisch virtues of nationalism, capitalism and heterosexuality, Bush is truth.
["Völkisch" -- very nice.]
The second highlight? Sen. Zell Miller (DINO - Georgia) awarded CPAC's 2005 "Courage Under Fire" Award to the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.
ACU Chairman David Keene said of this year's recipients:
For a second time, the Swift Boat veterans stepped up to serve their country honorably and courageously by telling the truth about John Kerry's tour of duty in Vietnam. Despite vilification, character assassination, and the hostility of the elite media, these veterans dared to tell a side of the story that the American people otherwise would not have heard. John Kerry truly was unfit to serve as commander-in-chief and these veterans had the courage to say so publicly. ... These Vietnam veterans did not have to stand up and expose themselves to the opprobrium of the liberal media. ...They could have remained silent, comfortably out of the public eye and the line of fire. But they put the good of their country ahead of their own personal interests.
Note that here the (less than adequate) critical scrutiny given to the SBV's story is likened to taking a second tour of duty and being "in the line of fire" from the "elite" "liberal" media. In short, to criticize conservative activists is to attack them.
[Personal note: Due to my apartment's network being down, I've been unable to post for several days.]
3:57:27 PM 
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