Crony Conservatism

by Saraimage Tom Tomorrow

My, my, my. It's such a cozy little world….especially if you're a conservative.

We all know Ann Coulter's said some grotesquely hateful things over the years. What you may not realize, though, is how many of the most memorable bombshells got dropped in just one venue. She seems to save up her most horrific stuff for the annual CPAC conference, where she's been a fixture for many years. In fact, looking back on just her CPAC performances alone is a fairly comprehensive summary of Coulter's most gobstopping moments:

CPAC 2007 -- "I was going to have a few comments on the other Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, but it turns out you have to go into rehab if you use the word ‘faggot,’ so I — so kind of an impasse, can’t really talk about Edwards.”

CPAC 2006 -- "I think our motto should be post-9-11, 'raghead talks tough, raghead faces consequences.'"

CPAC 2005 -- “Liberals like to scream and howl about McCarthyism, I say let’s give them some. They’ve have intellectual terror on campus for years....it’s time for a new McCarthyism.”

“Since they’re always acting like they’re oppressed…I say let’s do it, let’s oppress them.”

“In addition to racist and Nazi, how about adding traitor to the list of things that professors can’t be? And yes, I realize I just proposed firing the entire Harvard faculty.”

CPAC 2004 -- "You can never be too scandalous in talking about liberals. These people are animals; they want to destroy the country and they support the Taliban and al-Qaida the way they supported Stalin in McCarthy's day." (She also characterized the Democratic Party as being run by "breathtakingly stupid women").

CPAC 2003 -- “Why not go to war just for oil? We need oil."

CPAC 2002 -- "In contemplating college liberals, you really regret, once again, that John Walker is not getting the death penalty. We need to execute people like John Walker in order to physically intimidate liberals by making them realize that they could be killed, too. Otherwise they will turn out into outright traitors."

According to PFAW, in this same talk Coulter also accused U.S. Transportation Secretary Norman Mineta of being consumed with hatred for America, belittled his experiences in Japanese-American internment camps during World War II, and appeared to imply that she would celebrate if he were killed.

CPAC 2001 -- From PFAW's coverage: Ann Coulter informed the crowd that George W. Bush has done a spectacular job during his first month in office, and speculated that perhaps he is far more clever than people had believed. In less than a month, Coulter stated, Bush has managed to totally disarm the Democrat's most cliched criticism: that Republicans are mean. Coulter suggested that Bush has apparently figured out that "all you have to do is go around calling yourself nice," making it surprisingly "easy to hornswoggle liberals." Bush has managed to control the agenda, and will continue to do so, said Coulter, as long as he continues to "treat liberals like small children having nightmares." According to Coulter, it seems as if "the mistake Republicans have been making for years was to treat liberals like adults."

CPAC 2000 -- Coulter received CPAC's annual journalism award. (Hard to believe we've endured over seven years of her already, isn't it?)

It’s obvious that there's a lot of synergy between CPAC and Coulter: each has leveraged their fame on the platform of the other. It's not surprising, when you consider the ties between the two. And here's where it gets cozy.

Conservative blogger Lydia Cornell (no friend of Ann, she) recently pointed out that Ann's personal bodyguard, Floyd Resnick, is also Director of Security for CPAC. Resnick, a sometime stuntman and extra on various TV cop shows, is the owner of New York Close Protection Services, which says this about itself on its website:

" NYCPS is the only firm specializing in the safety and accessibility of the conservative philosophy. In a time when conservatives are physically and verbally attacked by those who disagree with them, the NYCPS Team is dedicated to ensuring that their clients are protected while getting their message out on college campuses, in local communities, and through media appearances.

For all their talk of liberals as effeminate wimps, evidently Mr. Resnick's clients find us very scary indeed. (Though as Cornell's blog illustrates, Resnick and his goons are not at all restrained about taking their aggression out on apostate conservatives as well.)

More interesting, however, is Resnick's partner is NYCPS, Lisa de Pasquale. De Pasquale is apparently a very busy lady: she's not only in the bodyguard business, but she is also the Director of CPAC (which means, basically, that it's her show). And she's also Ann Coulter's publicist -- which is why Ann saves her biggest steamers for CPAC events.

As a side job, de Pasquale & Resnick were researchers for Malkin's book, Unhinged. She mentions them by name in the blog post announcing the release of the book:

My intrepid researchers, Lisa de Pasquale and Floyd Resnick of New York Close Protection Services, dug up many of the photos featured inside the book's Unhinged Gallery and many more that didn't make it into the book.

It’s a small, small world.

h/t to an anonymous cat