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CPAC: Anti-Muslim Activist James Lafferty Says He's 'Proud' of Attacks against Mosques

Submitted by Brian Tashman on February 10, 2012 - 7:15pm

The Conservative Political Action Conference panel “Islamic Law in America: How the Obama Justice Department Is Selling Us Out,” featured numerous anti-Muslim speakers including Pamela Geller, Robert Spencer, Ilaria Pantano and James Lafferty of the Virginia Anti-Sharia Task Force. Lafferty, whose wife Andrea runs the Traditional Values Coalition, dedicated his speech to his activism against mosques in his community and a Muslim Republican’s candidacy for the state House of Delegates.

Lafferty told the guests that “we are being outgunned by them, literally and figuratively” and claimed, “This is a spiritual war we are fighting.” At one point in his talk, Lafferty described a Justice Department “hate crimes summit” he attended. He expressed pride in the fact that most of the mosques that had been attacked were in the South:

Well with what the gentleman was saying about the Justice Department, I went to the briefing, the hate crimes summit, and I went there and it was all Muslim officials speaking and they had all these pictures of some mosque somewhere, and it was usually in the South I’m proud to say where a guy would drive a pickup truck right into the mosque. They had I bet 20—it looked like the same picture after a while because they just kept showing these same pictures, and each Muslim speaker got up, and remember this is a Justice Department meeting, and really ragged on two groups: the FBI and the NYPD. So whatever they’re doing they’re doing something good.

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CPAC: Gingrich Says Unemployment Benefits Violate The Declaration of Independence

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on February 10, 2012 - 5:17pm

Newt Gingrich was the last of the remaining Republican presidential candidates to address the audience at CPAC  this year and during his speech, he brought them to their feet by declaring that 99 weeks of unemployment benefits to those who have lost their jobs violates the Declaration of Independence:

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Rick Santorum Just Had Dinner with White Nationalist Bob Vandervoort

Submitted by Josh Glasstetter on February 10, 2012 - 5:14pm
Bob Vandervoort’s group, ProEnglish, just tweeted:
You’ll recall that Vandervoort, the executive director of Pro-English, was previously the leader of the white nationalist group Chicagoland Friends of the American Renaissance. He is scheduled to appear at a panel tomorrow morning at CPAC along with two Republican members of Congress and the Kansas Secretary of State, Kris Kobach.
 
Kobach, an outspoken immigration opponent, distanced himself from Vandervoort and ProEnglish this morning:
Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach said he “had no idea who was going to be on my panel” when he agreed to appear Saturday on an immigration panel at the Conservative Political Action Committee conference in Washington, D.C. […]
 
Kobach said he does not recall ever meeting Vandervoort. He also said organizers usually try to put people with differing views on panels to make it interesting.
 
The two split on bilingual ballots, mandated by federal voting law. Kobach said he thinks bilingual ballots are “reasonable,” so voters will clearly understand the ballot.
Around noon, the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Alex Nowrasteh, who is also scheduled for tomorrow’s panel, tweeted that Vandervoort appears to be a racist.
 
And the organizers of CPAC even distanced themselves from Vandervoort and another white nationalist speaking at the conference:
The American Conservative Union, CPAC’s organizer, is keeping its distance.
 
“This panel was not organized by the ACU,” CPAC spokeswoman Kristy Campbell told The Daily Caller, ”and specific questions on the event, content or speakers should be directed to the sponsoring organization.” 
Despite all of this, Rick Santorum just had dinner with Vandervoort. We can hope that Santorum did not yet know Vandervoort’s full background. Now that he does, will he denounce white nationalists, including Vandervoort, and say they have no place within the GOP and conservative movement?
 
UPDATE: Santorum adviser Hogan Gidley told BuzzFeed that Vandervoort "was part of a large gathering that showed up to listen to rick speak today at a CPAC luncheon." No response yet from Vandervoort.
 
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Two Miami-Area Congressmen to Appear with White Nationalist at CPAC

Submitted by Josh Glasstetter on February 10, 2012 - 4:16pm

There’s already been substantial coverage of yesterday’s CPAC panel on multiculturalism featuring not one, but two, prominent white nationalists – Peter Brimelow and Bob Vandervoort. That may have just been the warm-up act for tomorrow morning.

Reps. Mario Diaz-Balart and David Rivera, both Republicans from the Miami metro area, are scheduled to appear on stage at CPAC with Vandervoort on an immigration panel entitled “High Fences, Wide Gates: States vs. the Feds, the Rule of Law & American Identity”:
 
 
Vandeervoort is currently the head of ProEnglish, which supports making English the official language of the US, but previously he was the leader of the white nationalist group Chicagoland Friends of the American Renaissance. As the Institute for Research & Education on Human Rights has reported:
Vandervoort was at the center of white nationalist activity during his time in Illinois. While he was in charge, Chicagoland Friends of American Renaissance often held joint meetings with the local chapter of the Council of Conservative Citizens. The group held events featuring numerous white nationalist figures. Vandervoort also made appearances at white nationalist events outside Illinois, for instance participating in the 2009 Preserving Western Civilization Conference.
 
Started as a modest newsletter in 1990, American Renaissance has grown into an important vehicle for white nationalist ideas. American Renaissance first described itself as a "literate, undeceived journal of race, immigration and the decline of civility." It claimed that "White people" had lost their voice and that the United States was in danger of losing its "national and cultural core."
American Renaissance founder Jared Taylor wrote in the magazine that “the greatest threat to whites today comes from immigration.” He continued: “Racial preferences, guilt-mongering, anti-Western education, even anti-white violence are manageable problems compared to a process that is displacing whites and reducing them to a minority. With a change in thinking at the right levels, anti-white policies and double standards could be done away with practically overnight, but that would still leave us with nearly 100 million non-whites living in the country.”
 
Vandervoort’s extremism hasn’t gone unnoticed by conservatives who don’t share his bigoted ideology, including fellow panelist Alex Nowrasteh, who suggested today that Vandervoort is a racist:
The conservative Daily Caller also noted the explicit white nationalism of American Renaissance and put the conference organizers on the defensive:
The American Conservative Union, CPAC’s organizer, is keeping its distance.
 
“This panel was not organized by the ACU,” CPAC spokeswoman Kristy Campbell told The Daily Caller, ”and specific questions on the event, content or speakers should be directed to the sponsoring organization.”
But let’s recall that the American Conservative Union was fully in control when it came to GOProud, the conservative gay rights group that it banned from CPAC this year. Evidently, they can keep gay groups out but are powerless when it comes to white nationalists.
 
Which brings us back to tomorrow’s panel featuring Vandervoort, two Republican members of Congress, and Kris Kobach, Secretary of State of Kansas. Do Reps. Diaz-Balart and Rivera and Secretary Kobach really think it’s appropriate to appear on stage with a white nationalist? Will they denounce white nationalism and say it has no place within the GOP and conservative movement?
 
Tune in tomorrow morning to find out.

 

 

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CPAC: NRA's LaPierre Uncovers 'Massive Obama Conspiracy'

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on February 10, 2012 - 2:44pm

Wayne LaPierre of the National Rifle Association uncovered a "massive Obama conspiracy" during his remarks at CPAC, explaining that the administration hasn't done anything on gun rights in the first term intentionally in order to lull gun owners in a false sense of security and keep them from voting so that he can win a second term and finally "destroy the Second Amendment":

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CPAC: Romney Prevented MA from Becoming the 'Las Vegas of Gay Marriage'

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on February 10, 2012 - 1:52pm

There is something truly remarkable about watching Mitt Romney address the audience at CPAC and lecture them about what it means to be a conservative as he tries to convince them that he has been a champion of conservative values throughout his political career ... leading to situations such as this where he takes credit for preventing Massachusetts "from becoming the Las Vegas of gay marriage":

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CPAC: Coulter Compares Obama to Flavor Flav

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on February 10, 2012 - 12:55pm

This year's CPAC has been an extremely disjointed event as conservatives keep trying to come to grips with the fact that they dislike their Republican choices for president only slightly less than they dislike President Obama.

Nothing better exemplifies this fundamental tension than the fact that perennial CPAC favorite Ann Coulter could barely even muster tepid applause from the crowd as she half-heartedly tried to make the case for Mitt Romney. But she did still manage to throw out some vintage Coulter-esque red meat to the audience, like when she compared President Obama to Flavor Flav:

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CPAC: White Nationalism Shunned in 2011, Welcomed in 2012

Submitted by Josh Glasstetter on February 10, 2012 - 12:44pm

How times have changed. Last year, white nationalist Jamie Kelso attended CPAC looking for European-American allies in his quest to keep America genetically pure and lily-white. However, his potential young recruits weren’t having any of it:

As Ed Morrissey reported on Hot Air:
A group of young attendees, and a few older conservatives as well, at first politely rebuff Kelso’s racist arguments, and then begin aggressively arguing with him in the hallway. Ron Paul supporters told him four times to take off his Campaign for Liberty button and paraphernalia.
The Daily Caller reported that Kelso “got an earful from some conservative activists who sent him packing” and “let him know that racism is not welcome in the conservative movement.” It was heartening to see young conservatives take a stand against the kind of bigotry that has no place in modern conservatism.
 
That was 2011. CPAC 2012 has revealed that the paleoconservatives are still firmly in control.
 
The conservative gay rights group, GOProud, was banned this year, but two prominent white nationalists were allowed to appear on a panel opposing multiculturalism.
 
And they were hardly sent packing. Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King of Iowa fawned over Peter Brimelow, founder of the white nationalist site VDARE, saying, “I read your books!” Tomorrow, white nationalist Bob Vandervoort is scheduled to appear alongside two other Republican members of Congress.

 

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CPAC: Santorum Says There is no Right to Health Care

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on February 10, 2012 - 12:22pm

Addressing the crowd at CPAC, Rick Santorum attacked the idea that there is any sort of right to health care, saying that the passage of healthcare reform legislation is a form of enslavement and the ultimate loss of freedom:

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CPAC: Christians Have Been too Nice and Need to Stop Compromising

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on February 10, 2012 - 11:15am

During a panel at CPAC on "The Role of Faith, Life, & Family in Our Culture & the 2012 Elections," the panelists claimed that the slippery slope toward gay marriage all began when people started accepting the idea of recognizing the legitimacy pf gay relationships by granting civil unions, and Andy Blom, Executive Director of the American Principles Project, blamed it on the fact that Christians just don't want to be mean and called on Christians to be aggressive in defending their values and refuse to compromise:

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