Tea Party to Launch Magazine at CPAC

Conservative activists will flock to Washington Thursday for a popular annual political conference. The 3-day Conservative Political Action Conference has long been a rallying point for conservatives of all stripes - but this year, the Tea Party will be competing with the mainline Republican message by launching its own magazine - just for Tea Party groups.

The Tea Party Review, billed as "the first national magazine for, by and about the Tea Party movement," is slated to launch at a meet-and-greet at CPAC on Saturday. Created by a Christian niche publisher and sold at a yearly subscription rate of $34.95, the magazine will provide a forum for Tea Partiers to "come together, to trade ideas, to resolve disputes, [and] to find out what other activists are doing and thinking," according to its website. Announced topics include "Obama's War on the First Amendment...and the Rest of the Constitution," "Will Republicans Keep Their ‘Pledge'?", and "Why the Elite Media Hate Us."

It's not the first time the Tea Party has co-opted a broader conservative rallying point to advance its own message. Minnesota Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann gave her own rebuttal to the president's State of the Union Address after the traditional Republican response. The event was broadcast by the Tea Party, a tactic used to disseminate a tea party town hall held earlier this week.

Asked why CPAC was chosen as the launch point for the publication, National Grassroots Director Katrina Pierson tells FOX News simply, "You of course want to launch a conservative magazine during a big conservative event, and CPAC is a conservative event."

Pierson, a member of the Dallas Tea Party, sees the magazine as a way to present the views of all Tea Party groups - not just the most well-known organizations like the Tea Party Express. "We've seen national groups make statements, and those are taken as a statement from the movement, and that's not the case," she says.

A panel discussion co-sponsored by Tea Party-affiliated group FreedomWorks and entitled, "New Media Activism: From Behind the Scenes to Boots on the Ground," echoes that emphasis on bucking more traditional means of communication in favor of a more grassroots approach.

As for whether presenting a Tea Party-specific magazine at a mainline conservative event might draw criticism, Pierson says, "Anytime the Tea Party is involved, there's some type of negative feedback," adding, once people get their hands on the magazine -- and the message -- those critical reactions will disappear.