One of the panelists on a discussion conservative women in politics had a message for men within the party: no dumb comments this cycle and let women talk about contraception.

"We cannot have any stupid comments this year. No stupid comments," conservative author Kate Obenshain said Saturday at the Conservative Political Action Conference. "Please think before you make pithy, obnoxious comments."

"White men stay behind, let the women talk about this issue. We love white men. We love all the white men," Obenshain said before adding that it's important for women to talk about those issues.

I add “meaningful” because there was something of an effort at trying to address the Republican Party’s problem with race. To wit, the main attraction for Thursday afternoon was a panel on outreach to “nontraditional voting blocs,” featuring Ed Gillespie, the former RNC head turned Senate candidate in Virginia, and two black conservatives: Robert Woodson, president of the Center for Neighborhood Enterprise, and Elroy Sailor, a close partner of former Rep. J.C. Watts.

It wasn’t a bad lineup. But there were two big problems. First, no one cared. The event—held on the main stage of the conference—was nearly empty. The CPAC crowd, it seemed, had better things to do than think about its relationship with black and brown Americans.

And second? Judging from the description, the panel was designed for disappointment. Billed as a discussion on “how to bring conservative ideas of liberty, opportunity, and prosperity to nontraditional voting blocs and teach party and movement leaders how to embrace them,” the hourlong panel was a rote restatement of the GOP boilerplate on outreach.

“People are looking at Putin as one who wrestles bears and drills for oil. They look at our president as one who wears mom jeans,” Palin said “Anyone who carries the commonsense gene would know that Putin doesn’t change his stripes,” she said. “He wants to exert huge power and dominance, so he has to get to those border areas and he has to capture them.”

Failing to show peace through strength has allowed some “very, very, very bad dudes (to) gain ground”, said Palin, who remains a darling of the far-right.

Obama “would gut our arsenal while he allows others — enemies — to enrich theirs”, she said.

“Mr President, the only thing that stops a bad guy with a nuke is a good guy with a nuke.”