The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

CPAC 2023: ‘Media Logistics’ & a Strange Memo From the National Affairs Desk

Posted on | March 4, 2023 | 1 Comment

The National Affairs Desk, 9:14 a.m. today

NATIONAL HARBOR, Maryland
Because I was busy doing other things, I didn’t notice this email that went out yesterday from CPAC Communications:

MEDIA LOGISTICS FOR CPAC IN DC 2023
Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center . . .
Saturday, March 4, 2023
2:00 AM – 5:00 AM: A security sweep will be conducted at this time. No media will be allowed onsite.
5:00 AM: Media Entry
Media entrance is located at the Maryland Ballroom Entrance. You will only be able to access the event at the Maryland Ballroom Entrance.
If you do not arrive at 5AM – you will have to wait in the general security line. There is not a press entrance.
All media must enter by 10:00 AM. Late entries will not be granted access. No exceptions. . . .
7:00 AM – 9:00 AM: Pre-Credential Press Pick-Up
Media registration will close at 9:00 AM and not re-open. All late arrivals will not have access to the event without a credential.

It’s 10 o’clock as I write this and, if I understand this email correctly, (a) even to get access to the conference area, I’ll have to go through the security line (metal detectors, etc.) with thousands of other people, and (b) I won’t be granted access to the media area at all. Which means that I’m probably going to be covering today’s events from here in the lobby of my hotel across the street from the convention center. Which is par for the course, really, and however badly screwed I am in terms of this “media logistics” arrangement, I’m not as badly screwed as my old buddy Mike LaChance, who came here to cover CPAC for Legal Insurrection. Mike also writes for Gateway Pundit and Twitchy, so it’s not as if he’s an obscure lightweight in the realm of conservative media. But somehow, the folks in charge of media credentials at CPAC didn’t understand how important Mike is. His email request for credentials apparently got lost in the shuffle, and no matter how many times he went back to media registration — five or six times, I think — they kept turning him down.

In other words, Mike’s going scorched earth and, for the sake of my own access, permit me to say as a professional journalist that I do not endorse scorched-earth reprisals like this, no matter how screwed-up the situation may be, objectively speaking. This official non-endorsement of Mike’s blood-oath vengeance crusade is necessary, you see, on the outside chance that CPAC staffers may actually bother reading my blog. But if they don’t understand how important Legal Insurrection, Gateway Pundit and Twitchy are . . . ? Well, even if I did endorse Mike’s anti-CPAC vendetta (which, I must repeat, I do not), the people who screwed Mike over on his credentials probably wouldn’t ever read my endorsement. Or, to quote Hillary Clinton: “What difference, at this point, does it make?”



 

 

Category: CPAC

Comments

One Response to “CPAC 2023: ‘Media Logistics’ & a Strange Memo From the National Affairs Desk”

  1. My CPAC 2023 Adventure – And Why I’m Never Going Back
    March 5th, 2023 @ 7:02 pm

    […] a very funny piece over at The Other McCain, Stacy wrote about my troubles and advised me not to go too scorched earth in my write up of the event, and I’m not. […]