Conservatives ‘Let Their Hair Down’
Nationally prominent conservatives returned to the “Dark Ages” in Miami over the weekend for golf, balmy breezes and a chance to retool their message.
Many who attended the “Dark Ages Weekend” worried aloud that President Clinton has gained the upper hand in the budget debate by portraying Republicans as uncaring and their revolution as cruel.
Now the conservatives are looking for a way to convince the nation that eliminating welfare, shredding regulations and cutting government is about helping people, not just saving money.
“We need to do better at capturing the moral high ground, stop talking purely in terms of dollars and cents,” said Arianna Huffington, an organizer of the weekend and wife of California millionaire and unsuccessful Senate candidate Michael Huffington. “Cutting the government is only half the equation. The other half is removing government barriers to helping people, encouraging community solutions.”
The name of the event is a spoof of the New Year’s Renaissance Weekend on Hilton Head Island in South Carolina, popular with liberals and moderates, and frequented by President Clinton. The Miami event attracted more than 300 prominent conservatives from politics, business and journalism to the Doral Golf Resort and Spa west of Miami.
The weekend included the Charlemagne tennis tournament, a Canterbury Tales banquet, a William the Conqueror golf tournament and a masquerade party as well as aerobic boxing with well-known liberal targets taped to the punching bags.
The conservatives said they’re tired of being viewed as humorless, mean-spirited and stuffy. And several conceded the Democrats have at least temporarily gained the high ground in the national debate.
Most of the panels, focusing on such issues as welfare, the environment and the entertainment industry, concentrated on better salesmanship for the GOP revolution.
“Conservatives are driving the political discourse in this country,” said Laura Ingraham, who joined fellow Washington lawyer Jay Lefkowitz in putting the weekend together. “This is a chance for conservatives to sit back, let their hair down and hammer out differences of opinion - and there are a lot of them.”
But the former aide to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas noted: “We are trying to be a bit tongue in cheek and have fun. Part of our litmus test is if you don’t get the joke you won’t be invited back.”
They set 10 politically incorrect conference rules such as: No group hugs. No environmentally safe aerosol spray cans. No buying beer for Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed. And all Republican women must wear furs despite temperatures in the 70s.
The weekend was largely a lesson in how to better deliver the conservative message. Recent polls indicated Clinton gained the upper hand in the budget debate by saying he was defending the elderly and poor by fighting sharp cuts in Medicaid and Medicare.