CPAC 2009: Day Two

Judging by the atmosphere here at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), rumors of the death of American Conservatism are extremely premature.

In fact, more people registered for the conference this year than any year in it history – impressive when you consider that last year's program included Bush, Cheney, and all of the remaining GOP candidates for presidents (former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney used his address to drop out of the race).

Furthermore, a lot of the speakers seem unusually pumped up...arguably more so than last year. Maybe it has to do with the fact that Republican lawmakers are finally rediscovering their principles, or maybe it's just easier to get back to basics when there's no Bush Administration to defend.

(Yesterday, I Tweeted that the audience seemed smaller and more subdued -- that certainly changed today).

As a credentialed blogger, I was privy to some behind-the-scenes meetings -- which tend to generate more interesting tidbits than the speeches do.

My morning started at 8:30 in the Hampton Room of the Omni Shoreham, where 40 or 50 prominent conservative bloggers gathered to meet with former Speaker Newt Gingrich (few speakers could draw that many bloggers -- that early in the morning).

Newt told bloggers, 'It's not our job to be the opposition party. It's our job to be the 'better solutions party," but also noted that President Barack Obama has spent more in his 1st month than President George W. Bush spent in Iraq, Afghanistan and on Katrina in 7 years.

Following the Gingrich meeting, I attended a smaller gathering of bloggers and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. Of interest, McConnell defended Republican stimulus defectors on the grounds that you can't run in Maine the way you would run in Alabama. He also predicted Senate Republicans would unanimously oppose "card check" legislation.

The speeches were good, too. Solid conservative leaders like Rep. Mike Pence are coming into their own and talking about victories within the House Republican Conference, and the Obama Administration is providing plenty of policies to attack.

People were still talking about Ambassador John Bolton -- one of the better acts yesterday -- who brought the house down with a scathing rebuke of liberal foreign policy. In fact, it was so good that even our liberal friends at ThinkProgress took notice – they massively misconstrued one of his remarks to make it look like he actually wanted Obama's hometown of Chicago nuked Actually, he was suggesting that the Iranians might eventually get a big enough weapon to nuke Chicago if Obama continues to coddle them.

But, as shown at the world premiere of John Ziegler's documentary "Media Malpractice", that's just how the mainstream media operates.

Former Speaker Gingrich was also in rare form, beginning his speech by making a dramatic entry from the back of the room and shaking every hand on his way to the podium. He exited the stage to the sound of Queen's "We Will Rock You" ...something tells me he might be considering running for President (I nearly voted for him in the CPAC Straw Poll).

Of course, the speech was pretty good too, as Gingrich railed against Eric Holderand challenged him to a debate on cowardice. He also pulled a fast one by "card checking" the conference with a "Win a Wii" raffle, where the entry cards actually had unionization language in the fine print.

All in all, it was a good day. Tomorrow, of course, the straw poll results are announced, and, oh yeah, Rush Limbaugh speaks...