WhoWhatWhy at CPAC: Fissures Mask Unity of Trump’s Base
- Submitted by: Love Knowledge
- Category: Politics
The post WhoWhatWhy at CPAC: Fissures Mask Unity of Trump’s Base appeared first on WhoWhatWhy.
The alt-right took a public beating at last week’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), but the undercurrents of the conference show that the far right is welcome among conservatives, at least for now.
The tone of the conference was set by the executive director of the American Conservative Union (ACU), Dan Schneider, when he warned of infiltration by alt-right figures into the conservative movement. He described their ideology as a betrayal of conservative values, casting them as “left-wing fascists” — a tortured line of logic borrowed from National Review’s Jonah Goldberg. He labelled them anti-Semites, racists, and sexists, while also asserting that they are “not like anybody here.”
That would have sounded more believable had alt-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos not been invited to the gathering and been given a prominent speaking slot before being shunned after a video surfaced that appeared to show him defending pedophelia.
That kicked off a wider condemnation of the alt-right that culminated in Richard Spencer, the white-nationalist poster boy of the alt-right, being kicked out of the conference.
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