Joe the Plumber to Advise Young Republicans at Conservative Conference

Posted by Katharine Zaleski, Huffington Post at 4:58 AM on February 26, 2009.

On Thursday, conservatives will be descending on Washington DC, the place they like to slam the most, to galvanize their mission to take back Congress and the presidency. Reports say this year's Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) will bring in record numbers despite it not being a midterm or presidential election year. According to The Washington Times, 7,000 people attended last year and 9,000 are expected this year.

Last year President Bush and Cheney were the stars of the event. And Mitt Romney chose the conference to announce that he was suspending his campaign.

This year, Cheney and Bush are off the agenda, replaced by ghosts of the campaign trail like Joe the Plumber (Joe Wurzelbacher) and documentarian John Ziegler, who has been making the rounds to restore Sarah Palin's self-imposed media debacle with his documentary "Media Malpractice: How Obama Got Elected and Palin Was Targeted." And of course Rush Limbaugh will be there as the biggest draw.

Other events include: "Al Franken and ACORN: How Liberals are Destroying the American Election System"; "The Presidential Banquet with Master of Ceremonies: Rep. Michelle Bachmann"; "Bailing Out Big Business: Are We All Socialists Now?"; A book signing with Ann Coulter; "Media in the Obama Era: Is Journalism Dead?"; "The True Cost Of Global Warming Hysteria"; and "Will Congress Take Your Guns?"

Katharine Zaleski has been the News Editor of the Huffington Post since May 2005.