If you’re a reader of World Net Daily, a fan of Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) or a regular reader of anti-Muslim columnist Frank Gaffney, you know all about the controversies surrounding the attendance of gay Republicans and Muslim conservatives at the Conservative Political Action Conference later this week.
But anti-gay and anti-Muslim CPAC attendees, take heart! There are still plenty of scheduled non-official CPAC events for the Islamo- and homophobic conservatives in your family.
In the anti-Muslim corner, there will be not one but two screenings of “The Ground Zero Mosque: The Second Wave of the 9/11 Attacks,” one of which will be followed by speeches by Pamela Geller and Robert Spencer. Refreshments will be served.
That’s an event that ex-Bush administration staffer Suhail Khan, who now works with the group Muslims for America, calls a “little hate fest.” Khan noted that most of the anti-Muslim gathers were “not official CPAC events” and told TPM that Geller’s screening was “laughable.”
Still Khan said he’s all for free speech and that his answer to hateful rhetoric is more speech. One way he’s hitting back: he’ll be moderating a CPAC panel on Friday titled “The Importance of Faith & Religious Liberty in the US & Abroad.”
The Clarion Fund, which may have helped fuel fears over the so-called “Ground Zero Mosque” with millions of DVDs it mailed out ahead of the 2008 elections, will also be screening a film titled “Iranium,” at CPAC which “explores the dangers posed to the United States and the international community by a nuclear Iran.”
There will also be an event where fans of Brigitte Gabriel can get their copy of They Must Be Stopped: Why We Must Defeat Radical Islam and How We Can Do It signed.
If anti-gay events are more your cup of tea, there’s “How Political Correctness is Harming America’s Military” in the Marshall Ballroom on Thursday, featuring Elaine Donnelly of the Center for Military Readiness (which supports the continuation of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell). There’s also “Traditional Marriage and Society” featuring (among others) Rep. Randy Hultgren (IL) and Bishop Harry Jackson of the Hope Christian Church.
Groups opposed to the participation of the conservative group GOProud in CPAC are still mounting a campaign to stop the group from participating. Yesterday there was a full-page ad in the Washington Times invoking the legacy of former President Ronald Reagan to put an end to the group’s involvement.
[Ed. note: This post has been corrected to reflect the fact that Khan works only informally with the group Muslims for America.]
