The event is a riotous and self-con­grat­u­la­to­ry anger fes­ti­val show­cas­ing the many faults of the most mil­i­tant, reac­tionary and dan­ger­ous wings of the Repub­li­can Par­ty and the con­ser­v­a­tive move­ment. The prime speak­ers at the event includ­ed Glenn Beck, Rush Lim­baugh and Ann Coul­ter — a ver­i­ta­ble laun­dry list of exact­ly who should not be in charge of steer­ing a move­ment, let alone a polit­i­cal party.

In the past, CPAC has been crit­i­cized for its vit­ri­olic style. Matthew Albright , a jour­nal­ist for the award-win­ning Louisiana State Uni­ver­si­ty Dai­ly Reveille, once described the youth pres­ence at CPAC as ​“dis­turb­ing, but only because CPAC itself is disturbing.”

Accord­ing to CPAC’s web­site, the con­fer­ence is a great meet-up oppor­tu­ni­ty for activists to min­gle with con­ser­v­a­tive lead­ers in order to share their resources. The web­site also adds CPAC is super awe­some for ​“Aver­age Joes” and stu­dents who might find the speak­ers and par­tic­i­pants ​“inspir­ing and enlight­en­ing” since ordi­nar­i­ly the ​“lib­er­al left tends to encom­pass every­thing that hap­pens on col­lege campuses.”

Con­ser­v­a­tives from across the coun­try will con­verge upon Wash­ing­ton today for the Con­ser­v­a­tive Polit­i­cal Action Con­fer­ence (CPAC), fea­tur­ing such promi­nent speak­ers as Flori­da Gov­er­nor Rick Scott, Texas Gov­er­nor Rick Per­ry, and Ken­tucky Sen­a­tor Rand Paul.

It was CPAC’s embrace of James O’Keefe, who is cur­rent­ly serv­ing a three-year pro­ba­tion­ary sen­tence after plead­ing to a mis­de­meanour in court (reduced from an ini­tial FBI felony charge of mali­cious­ly inter­fer­ing with the tele­phones at U.S. Sen­a­tor Mary Lan­drieu’s office) that led Albright to write, ​“Instead of being shunned, this thug – who may well be a felon before the year is out – was giv­en a hero’s wel­come at the par­ty, includ­ing an open bar tab, VIP spots and all the cig­ars he could smoke.”

CPAC pre­vi­ous­ly made waves when thir­teen-year-old Jonathan Krohn spoke at a 2009 pan­el about grass­roots activists, deliv­er­ing his speech, ​“Con­ser­v­a­tives Vic­to­ries Across the Nation.”

CPAC gath­er­ings in the past have fea­tured intra-par­ty squab­bling over the pres­ence of GOProud, a gay con­ser­v­a­tive group. Found­ed in 2009, GOProud adver­tis­es itself as a group that advo­cates for a ​“tra­di­tion­al con­ser­v­a­tive agen­da that empha­sizes lim­it­ed gov­ern­ment, indi­vid­ual lib­er­ty, free mar­kets and a con­fi­dent for­eign pol­i­cy.” But the involve­ment of icky gays was enough to send a non-prof­it group called the Amer­i­can Prin­ci­ples Project com­plete­ly over the edge.

Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Andy Blom told ABC News that his group pulled out of the con­fer­ence last year because his mem­bers regard the ​“sanc­ti­ty of mar­riage as every bit as impor­tant as keep­ing tax­es low.”

This year, the list of speak­ers includes Rep. Michele Bach­mann, Speak­er John Boehn­er, John Bolton, Andrew Bre­it­bart, Her­man Cain, Ann Coul­ter, Jon­ah Gold­berg, Mike Huck­abee, Lau­ra Ingra­ham, Gov. Bob­by Jin­dal, Sen. Mitch McConnell, Grover Norquist, Sarah Palin, Tony Perkins, Mitt Rom­ney, Sen. Mar­co Rubio, Rep. Paul Ryan, Sen. Rick San­to­rum, Phyl­lis Schlafy, Gov. Scott Walk­er, and Rep. Allen West, among others.

Con­tro­ver­sial­ly, CBS News cor­re­spon­dent Sharyl Attkisson is set to receive a jour­nal­ism award at the con­fer­ence from Accu­ra­cy in Media, a right-wing group with a long his­to­ry of pro­mot­ing anti-gay views and con­spir­a­cy the­o­ries. Attkisson will be the first reporter from a main­stream news out­let to receive AIM’s annu­al award. Media Mat­ters chron­i­cled AIM and Attkisson’s bad jour­nal­ism over the past year, involv­ing the top­ics of clean ener­gy, homo­sex­u­al­i­ty, and vaccines.

CPAC’s state­ment that the con­fer­ence is an excel­lent meet-up point for activists may prove pro­lif­ic, although they may not be thrilled with the type of demon­stra­tors the event attracts.

Occu­py DC plans to protest the four-day con­fer­ence in an attempt to ​“lib­er­ate dis­course.” An announce­ment from the group reads: ​“This event is anoth­er gath­er­ing of big­ots, media mouth­pieces, cor­rupt politi­cians, and their 1 per­cent elite pup­pet masters.”

​“CPAC will parade and attempt to per­pet­u­ate the rad­i­cal right wing’s impe­ri­al­ist ide­olo­gies with keynote speak­ers, movies and ban­quets ded­i­cat­ed to pur­su­ing its racist, sex­ist, patri­ar­chal and exploita­tive agen­da,” the move­ment said on its website.

Occu­py DC media team mem­ber Justin Smith did­n’t offer spe­cif­ic details to CBS News Polit­i­cal Hot­sheet on the planned demon­stra­tions, but he did make clear that the move­ment plans to engage with con­ser­v­a­tives all the way to Novem­ber’s election.

​“We want to make sure that atten­dees of CPAC — those peo­ple who will ulti­mate­ly do the work of the 1 per­cent — know that from the moment they get their march­ing orders, we’ll be chal­leng­ing them the whole way,” Smith said.

CPAC is aware of Occu­py DC’s plans and spokes­woman Kristy Cam­bell told CBS that the group’s tac­tics are ​“unfor­tu­nate,” adding that safe­ty at the con­fer­ence is her chief concern.

​“Our team is pre­pared and has a secu­ri­ty plan in place,” Camp­bell said.

The group is also upset that a sched­uled debate ​“Tak­ing Back Wall Street: The Tea Par­ty vs. Occu­py Wall Street,” fea­tures no rep­re­sen­ta­tive from the Occu­py Wall Street movement.

​“It’s remark­ably telling that it’s titled what it is because in fact we have a lot of com­mon ground with the Tea Par­ty,” Smith said. ​“CPAC is try­ing to dri­ve a wedge between” our two movements. … ​“Maybe we could sit down like human beings and have a con­ver­sa­tion about what’s going on in the coun­try,” he said, ​“and look for solu­tions instead of hav­ing car­toon rep­re­sen­ta­tions of our polit­i­cal viewpoints.”

Occu­py DC will be joined by mem­bers of oth­er orga­ni­za­tion, includ­ing the AFL-CIO, SEIU, Nation­al Nurs­es Unit­ed, and the Metro Labor Council.