CPAC Tribute: Andrew Breitbart Was the 'Quintessential Happy Warrior'

Andrew Breitbart was the “quintessential Happy Warrior,” radio host Larry O’Connor said during a Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) panel on Thursday honoring Andrew Breitbart, as panelists paid tribute to the conservative giant, recalling his sense of humor and keen understanding of the institutional left.

“He was a fighter, but I don’t want us to forget something— the term ‘Happy Warrior’ is thrown around a lot. He was the quintessential Happy Warrior. Andrew Breitbart was hilarious. The funnest time I’ve ever had in my entire professional life was the three years I worked with him. I never stopped laughing,” O’Connor told the audience and the other panelists, Breitbart News Washington bureau chief Matthew Boyle, Project Veritas founder James O’Keefe, and Turning Point USA founder and president Charlie Kirk.

“He was so much fun hanging out with him all the time,” Boyle said, recommending viewers to watch Andrew Breitbart’s old speeches to get a glimpse of the conservative fighter’s sense of humor. In one particular speech — his last CPAC speech in 2012 — Boyle recalled, Andrew detailed the time he dined with Weather Underground terrorists  Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn. This happened after Tucker Carlson won an online auction to dine with the couple and invited Andrew as his guest.

“In this speech at CPAC 2012, Andrew’s talking about how excellent a cook Bill Ayers is, right? Like, ‘He made very excellent ribs and succulent squash and everything,’ but then he’s like, ‘You know, they were very charming people,’ but then he goes, ‘But so was Ted Bundy.’ So again, Andrew —  a very funny guy, and that personality and that fun mentality, that Happy Warrior mentality, carries through,” Boyle said.

O’Keefe also spoke about Andrew’s personality and his ability to walk the line in holding the media accountable, yet speaking with them and working with them.

“That’s a very fine line,” O’Keefe said, noting that most people now hate the mainstream media. But Andrew, he said, was able to sort of “hack” the mainstream media and get them to cover things. 

“‘James… they want us on a leash, they want us to dance with them. But we’re not going to dance with them,'” O’Keefe said, paraphrasing what Andrew told him before his untimely passing. “He had this very profound intense way of speaking and he said, there was a quote he said where if you keep running toward the fire, if you keep going, you send a message to other people who are rooting for you that they, in fact, can do it too, if you keep going.”

“But he was a force of nature,” the Project Veritas founder added.