The 'Right' way
Fans pack Alex to hear conservative radio hosts back McCain and bash Obama
By Kirk Silsbee 09/11/2008
Many Southern Californians who get their news and opinion from the national and local mainstream media might assume that a win for Sen. Barack Obama in November is inevitable.
Conservative viewpoints, Republicans often lament, rarely surface in the LA Times, the Daily News of Los Angeles or the alternative weekly press. So, as is the case in many parts of the country, talk radio has come to act for some as powerful counterbalance to television news and the print media.
Glendale-based KRLA 870-AM has one of the most successful right wing talk formats in the region's radio market - strong enough for its listeners to pack Glendale's more than 1,300-seat Alex Theatre Sunday for the annual "Townhall 2008" talkfest, featuring station talk-show hosts Dennis Prager, Michael Medved and Hugh Hewitt.
It may not have exactly been a love-in, but people clearly cherish their radio pundits and relish their opinions.
The demographics of the evening's audience somewhat reflected the crowds at the Republican National Convention the previous week in St. Paul, Minn. The majority of people were white, but black, Asian, Armenian, Iranian and other ethnic variations were sprinkled throughout the venue. Religious differences also appeared to be set aside for the evening, with more than a few yarmulkes seen mingling comfortably with an occasional crucifix.
Even some who might normally not be associated with the Republican Party attended the show. One writer-performer of the bohemian art/entertainment scene - bicep tattoos exposed - stood out from the crowd.
"I've always been a Republican," the woman declared. "I don't want the government taking all the money I work so hard for. ... I'm still acting," she explained. "I'm writing for a paper, and I'm still doing porn."
On-air ads promoting the event promised some contentious exchanges, much like last year's program when Medved and FOX News commentator Laura Ingraham clashed on the subject of illegal immigration.
Prager, a moral philosopher who teaches the Torah, and Medved, a cultural critic and author, are religious Jews. In contrast, Hewitt, a Presbyterian, is a former talk show host who teaches constitutional law.
But Sunday's roundtable featured no verbal shootouts; the three pundits - all authors - expressed harmonious, though hardly identical perspectives about most of the topics discussed, many of which revolved around the presidential election.
With the Democratic and Republican conventions now over (Prager reported from both), "Townhall 2008" was a chance for speakers to connect with some of their listeners through a deeper dialectic, particularly when it came to the upcoming contest between Obama and Republican contender Sen. John McCain.
As might be expected given all the publicity that she has received since the convention, the first topic up for discussion was the selection of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as McCain's running mate.
Hewitt pegged Palin's choice as an indication of McCain's problems of solidifying his conservative base, and ultimately conceded that Medved was one of the few pundits who advocated McCain's nomination.
Hewitt also noted Palin's immediate resonance with working-class voters, citing the rash of "I Am Sarah Palin" T-shirts following McCain's selection. He warned that media hostility shown toward Palin and her family will incur a backlash because, "I think that women of America perceive the attacks on Sarah Palin as an attack on their sister."
Obama's character also came into question, with Prager issuing a warning to his conservative brethren: "It's important that we be careful not to disparage him as a person. I perceive him as dangerous, but not a bad man. He would be the first leftist to be elected president. Clinton was a liberal. Carter was a liberal who became a leftist and was defeated. A leftist has to hide his true self to be elected."
President George W. Bush was only referenced once during an exchange about Russia's recent invasion of Georgia, with Hewitt citing Bush naïvely saying, "I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy...," after meeting with Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, its former president and onetime head of the KGB.
But as bad as that might have been, Medved contrasted McCain's statements about solidarity with Georgia to Obama's somewhat tepid plea for both Russia and Georgia "to show restraint."
Prager, who did graduate work in Russian studies under Carter's National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski, asserted that "Putin wants to reconstitute the USSR. You can take the man out of the KGB, but you can't take the KGB out of the man."
Should McCain be elected, Hewitt acknowledged the need for bipartisan cooperation, saying that, "On most of the big, complicated issues - like Social Security, health care - he's going to have to work across the aisle."
In the end, however, for all the cheerleading being done for the McCain/Palin ticket, it came as no surprise to hear Medved close the show with a reference to Ronald Reagan, exhorting the crowd to "go out there and win this one for The Gipper."
DIGG | del.icio.us | REDDIT