CPAC Speaker Condemns CPAC For Allowing GOProud, Booed Off Stage
by TexasGOPVote on February 19, 2010 at 6:34 PM
At the 2010 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) today, there was a segment to recognize student conservative activists. When Ryan Sobra of the California Young Americans for Freedom organization went up to speak, instead of giving the speech he was scheduled to give, he decided to publicly denounce CPAC for allowing the gay conservative group GOProud to attend.
"Just to change the subject for just a second, Id like to condemn CPAC for bringing GOPride (sic) to this event," he said. The audience then erupted into a loud boo. Watch the video of the entire exchange below:
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Comments
Read the Platform, "gay" is not Conservative
The only reason for the "Proud" Group to show up as a "PAC" is to tell the rest of us that they have sexual relations with people of the same sex. I don't want to know.
Let them attend as Conservatives.
That is bullcrap, they were
It was obvious he was booed
See, the only reason is to tell us about their sex life.
Glad I wasn't there: I don't wish to cooperate with their attempt to act as though it's normal to identify oneself by sexual impropriety or to act as though there is such a thing as "marriage" between people of the same sex.
you don't know what conservative means
Under your definition, Reagan wasn't conservative: he helped raise money for Log Cabin Republicans and actively campaigned against the Briggs Initiative in California a couple years before the 1980 primaries (even Briggs later had a change of heart about his proposal, which lost in big part to Reagan's public opposition; it would've targeted gay and lesbian teachers in public schools). Under your definition, Barry Goldwater also wasn't conservative: he opposed the ban on gays in the military, thought they should be allowed to marry, etc.
Moreover, Goldwater came to despise the Religious Right because they weren't conservatives -- he viewed them as an insidious threat to real conservatism because their agenda wasn't based on expanding freedom but rather was oriented at authoritarianism of a theocratic sort. He joked with Bob Dole in 1996 that all of a sudden they were "liberals in the GOP" -- even though they're not the ones who'd changed; what had changed was that the GOP had a surge of southern white evangelical activists who suddenly decided everyone else was a "RINO."
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''The conservative movement is founded on the simple tenet that people have the right to live life as they please, as long as they don't hurt anyone else in the process.''
In the same article, Goldwater warned that ''the radical right has nearly ruined our party.''
''Its members do not care about the Constitution and they are the one making all the noise,'' he said.
http://www.azcentral.com/specials/special25/articles/0531goldwater2.html
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There's much more I could add to this to demonstrate that your view of conservatism isn't shared by many, but hopefully you get the point from two of the GOP's most influential -- and most conservative -- leaders of the past half century. What's being passed off as "conservatism" today from certain factions isn't conservative at all. I don't know who's been flaunting what at you, but I'd be more than happy to flaunt more truth your way -- and I'm sure you know the truth will set you free.
btw...
not true. that was mostly
Special interests don't self-identify by too much information
purge the party and make it smaller... a losing strategy
http://texasgopvote.com/blog/rise-latino-conservatism-02196
Identity groups don't just include people of certain races. I consider the Christian Coalition and all the other religious-based identity groups to be of the same kind as groups like Log Cabin, GOProud, etc. They also fit your own "definition": I don't know who's a Christian or "values voter" just by looking. I wouldn't deny any of them a place in the big tent even though I disagree with them on a few issues. It's none of my business what they believe in their own homes unless they try to use the force of government to make me believe it or act upon it in some manner.
In an era in which presidential candidates are winning with popular vote totals nearly even, and with state vote totals in some cases just as tight and throwing the Electoral College either way, I think it's foolish to try to make the party smaller by limiting activism. The same applies to Congressional races in such a polarized climate with a fickle electorate. Every vote counts, and the GOP should want to win as many of them as possible.
I agree with Reagan on this. Someone who's with you 80% or more of the time is worthy of support. I realize some people think the GOP is supposed to be run like a church with all kinds of purity and litmus tests on one or two issues. Why should it be any different for those who identify with the gay community (which isn't about sexual activity as much it is about orientation) as those who identify with the Christian community? We don't tell the Religious Right people to keep it quiet about their religious views, to leave it in their churches (even though I believe toning down the bigotry and "social warfare" rhetoric would only boost the GOP's chances in more races).
We're a political party, not an outgrowth of southern evangelicalism. It's time for the party, and its platform, to reflect that.
I recall that during the GOP
There are laws that discriminate against gay people. Of <ul>course</ul> they have formed political interest groups around their sexuality. You and I don't have to lobby for our rights as heterosexuals - usually: are we going to condemn people who are against the "marriage penalty" in the tax laws as flouting their sexuality, as well?
John Ensign. Mark Sanford. Newt Gingrich's 3 or 4 marriages. Larry Craig. Heck, Reagan was a divorcee.
If you don't practice what you preach, that just makes you a hypocrite. But when you try to put the force of law behind your personal beliefs and prejudices, that makes you a liberal.
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