I was red-pilled at CPAC

I thought my experience as a correspondent in the Middle East — where I covered the Syrian civil war, the rise and fall of Isis, refugee crises and the struggle for democracy in Lebanon — had given me a finely-tuned radar for tyranny and oppression. Boy, was I wrong

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How could I have been so blind?

Before arriving at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Florida this week, I confess to being ignorant of what was right before my eyes. I thought my experience as a correspondent in the Middle East — where I covered the Syrian civil war, the rise and fall of Isis, refugee crises and the struggle for democracy in Lebanon — had given me a finely-tuned radar for tyranny and oppression.

It was only after listening to the speakers at this annual gathering of conservatives in the Sunshine State that I discovered that America, my home of the last two years, was being ruled by a tyrannical regime.

It was a mistake for me to assume that the wealthiest country in the world, with the protection of free speech enshrined in its constitution, was free. The ironies abound: I learned about these horrors from the most privileged citizens of these United States, a crowd of mostly white and rich Republicans. Imagine my shock to discover that it was they who are the most oppressed.

I’m told conservatives call this kind of political awakening being “red-pilled.” It is a reference to a scene in The Matrix when Neo is offered a red or a blue pill — one will ensure he remains ignorant and asleep in an artificial world run by robots, while the other will set his body and mind free and throw him into the real world.

“Awake, not woke,” was the official tagline, and WiFi password, of this year’s CPAC. And I am now awake.

Onto the stage came a steady parade of speakers who had seen the tyranny with their own eyes. Those brave enough to speak out publicly in this land of mandates and scary books all had the same message: They are coming to get you. Exactly who “they” were changed depending on who was speaking: sometimes it was Democrats, sometimes it was the communists or Marxists; it could mean the “woke mob” or the cancel culture brigade. Often it was Joe Biden.

“They want to silence you, they want to subjugate you,” Texas senator Ted Cruz shrieked bravely during his speech, in which he called for “an unruly, uncontrollable, American, we the people.” I am ever grateful to Cruz for revealing the truth about Elizabeth Warren, a bespectacled former law professor and now the senior senator from Massachusetts. She had seemed so harmless.

“The Chinese communists and Elizabeth Warren both want to control you, your assets, your savings, your speech, your life, your children, every decision they want to control, and so we need to break up the means of controlling the citizenry,” Cruz revealed.

I’m grateful, too, for Florida senator Rick Scott for opening my eyes to the danger of the “militant left,” who he said represented a greater threat to the United States than every war it had ever fought. “We survived the War of 1812, the Civil War, World War One and World War Two, Korea, Vietnam, and the Cold War. But today we face the greatest danger we have ever faced. The militant left wing in our country has become the enemy within,” he said to applause.

In between speeches, we were played videos of Joe Biden slowed down and edited to make him appear confused and weak. These videos were extremely helpful in making me realize that old people move slowly.

It was inconvenient timing for the freedom fighters of CPAC that the eve of their conference coincided with another tyrant making his move. Vladimir Putin had just ordered the invasion of Ukraine, a democratic neighbor, using baseless justifications of historic grievances in an effort to rebuild Russia’s Soviet sphere of influence, when attendees were arriving. Thankfully, the speakers did not let that distract from their focus of tyranny here in the United States, such as the requirement for people to wear a small cloth mask when they enter certain businesses in certain areas.

It was wise of organisers not to interrupt their schedule with irrelevant happenings in Europe, where a military superpower was raining rockets down on the towns and cities of a democratic ally. Even if ordinary Ukrainians were lining up to receive guns to take on a 200,000-strong Russian army, how could these red-blooded conservatives live with themselves if they turned away from another panel discussion about the cancellation of Joe Rogan?

A look at the running order would tell you that the real problems are not out on the other side of the world; they are much closer to home. There were, in fact, more speeches that referenced the tyranny in Canada than the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As Ohio senate candidate JD Vance explained: “I’m sick of being told that we have to care about people 6,000 miles away than we do people like my mom, and my grandparents, and all the kids who are affected by this [opioid] crisis.”

Despite all the sad stories of oppression I heard at CPAC, nothing could have prepared me for the testimony from the final boss of grievance, the most oppressed man in America, former president Donald Trump. “They are continuing their evil and demented persecution of me, my family, my staff, my supporters and you,” he said. “It is the same witch hunt that has been going on since day one, since the day I came down the escalator.”

If these doom-laden pronouncements are dispiriting to the reader, fear not. The speakers and attendees at this year’s CPAC made it clear that they are fighters. They are ready to battle to the bitter end to defend the freedom of people who look and sound and think just like them, and only them. Surely that’s a comfort.