Rallying from the right
This year’s November election kicked off a hard-hitting town hall discussion Sunday night by conservative radio talk show hosts on issues ranging from the “tea party” movement to California’s business environment.
About 1,300 people attended 870 AM KRLA radio’s “Town hall 2010” forum at the Alex Theatre in Glendale, where radio hosts Dennis Prager, Michael Medved, Mike Gallagher and Kevin James took on some of the state’s and nation’s most pressing issues, including the upcoming Nov. 2 election.
Republicans could gain 20 to 90 Democratic seats in the House of Representatives and the Senate in this year’s election, Medved said.
“But it all depends on whether the president continues helping us,” he said.
Medved told audience members that the Democratic campaign has focused on irrelevant issues, including the controversy surrounding Republican Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell, who admitted on a 1990s TV show to dabbling in witchcraft as a teen.
Gallagher attributed the rise of the tea party movement to Sarah Palin, which Medved disagreed with.
“The tea party movement really is from the bottom up, not from the top down,” Medved said.
Middle-class, working Americans, he said, are mostly responsible for jumpstarting the tea party movement.
The forum began after a short video of radio host Glenn Beck played for the audience, along with a video presentation showing President Obama and other Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, making comments on unemployment and the economy.
Maintaining a viable business climate in California, Prager said, comes down to changing the negative perception of being successful.
Democrats, he said, are more interested in “equality than prosperity.”
“The quality is not of interest to the left,” Prager said. “They are not interested in prosperity. And only when you realize that they have different dreams, then you realize why that argument doesn’t matter. Of course, Republicans will be better for business. Democrats don’t care.”