I just got back from the speaking engagement of conservative talk radio host/blogger/law professor who was speaking at Claremont McKenna College. Very interesting stuff.

The most important thing I took from the talk was the importance of keeping an ear out for what the other side is saying. All too often I get stuck listening to people who agree with me without realizing there are quite a few people in this world who don't.

A great deal of the audience was conservative -- something rarely seen at the Claremont Colleges (even at the purportedly conservative CMC) -- and so I got to hear a number of talking points I had not yet been familiar with. A number of the people at my table, for instance, seemed to believe that Michael Schiavo was lying about his wife's sentiments, though they wouldn't say so outright.

Hewitt was extremely interesting in talking about the proliferation of the new media. Although I fundamentally disagree with him on many of his political conclusions, I was surprised to find that I agreed with him at times.

A few of things stuck out to me. Hewitt listed the five founding myths about blogs, some I agreed with, some I didn't. They were:

1. The Trent Lott Scandal (the reporting of Jonah Goldberg and Josh Marshall)
   
2. Howell Raines at The New York Times (losing his job on account of the Jayson Blair issues, and specifically blogs' commentary on it)
   
3. John Kerry's Swiftvet Issues (bloggers proved some of their claims to be true, thus allowing the media to listen to them)
   
4. Rathergate (the debunking of forged documents)
   
5. Eason Jordan at CNN (being forced out by blogs' reports of his comments in Switzerland)

Although I don't entirely agree with all of his points (Trent Lott lost his job because Bush no longer wanted him, though Marshall and Goldberg played a role, for example) and disagree with his omission of Jeff Gannon/James Guckert, it was interesting to hear how the other side thinks about the blogosphere.

During the Q&A session, I asked Hewitt about the success of Air America (how it has grown from three stations to 51 in a year, how it is outperforming rightwing radio in places like New York). His response was that Air America is "bad product" and it "won't last long." "It will ultimately fail." I fundamentally disagree with the conclusions Hewitt draws about Air America but he raised an interesting point. Air America isn't necessarily bad product in comparison with right wing talk radio (although I assume he believes it is); Air America is bad radio compared to NPR, which draws northwards of 20 million listeners each week. If Air America fails in the future -- I don't believe it will, though -- but if it does indeed fail, Hewitt's explanation that it loses to NPR, not Rush, will probably be correct.

After the talk and the Q&A, I went up to Hewitt and introduced myself. "Oh, the Air America guy!" I explained to him that he had assailed me in his blog two weeks earlier, though he had said he had just linked to me (which is probably closer to the truth). We talked a bit more about Air America -- I tried to rebut a few of his claims, he said he was bumped off the air in Eugene in favor of Air America -- and I gave him the info on my blog. It sounds like I have a shot at being assailed (or linked to) by Hewitt in the future -- perhaps even tomorrow -- and that's moderately exciting.