On the morning of the opening day of the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), I encountered a group of young women boarding a train at Dupont Circle Station in Washington, DC. They were wearing high heels and what seemed to be cocktail dresses underneath their winter coats. One of them sat down beside me. Her name was Tara and she used to be a treasury spokeswoman in the Bush administration; she was now working as a lobbyist, she confided ruefully. Her mother was one of the organisers of CPAC 2011 at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in upper north-west Washington. As we trudged uphill from the metro stop, Tara said: “There are a few strange people in there [the conference centre]. But then, you know, they can show up anywhere.”
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