See, I think what other posters are saying is part of it - he sees the profit in being controlled opposition. But I think it's also tied in with his desperate attempts at masculinity. He associates conservatism with the type of man he's pretending to be, so he's not a geek he's a stealthygeek. No, Pat's a real man who loves guns and cars and women! But those sorts of men aren't really common on the left, especially the guns bit, so he's really a conservative!
The cars and guns bit is also why he's a self-labeled conservative, I think. Like John Flynt, he's built so much of his personality around being an 'I love traditional male pursuits' guy. John uses it to be a delusional Cool Biker Chick, Pat to be a Manly Man, but it's the same compensation. Thing being, most of the leftists that Pat's trying to ingratiate himself with are the sort who will kick you out if you don't agree with them 100%, and the gun LARP is a point of difference. So he can't be part of the leftist club - but he can be their token 'conservative' friend who just happens to agree with them 99% of the time, and shows how open-minded they are by having one self-labeled conservative that they follow on Twitter. Where's your echo-chamber now, chuds! Pat's there to prove that all reasonable conservatives secretly believe exactly what they do, meaning any conservative who doesn't is clearly a Nazi fascist!
So Pat wanting to be controlled opposition is part of it, but also I think it wasn't a conscious grift. I think he found himself in that position within the groups he's part of, and like everything else somehow thinks he's worthy of being paid to do it.