A Memorable Experience

On Friday, I took part in the taping for the upcoming episode of "Virginia Viewpoints." I was honored to have spent both the taping time, as well as a good chunk of time afterwards, discussing and debating the topic at hand.

Just so you know, we were discussing immigration. This was a topic that I believe we probably could have done about 100 hours worth of tapings on. I believe our panel was intelligent, our discussion was civil, and I would like to think that I contributed to the conversation.

The panel was as follows:

- Chris Graham - Host of "Virginia Viewpoints", he is also the editor of The New Dominion.
- Phil Chroniger - Author of this blog, of course, and columnist for The New Dominion.
- Linda Jones - A regular on "Virginia Viewpoints", formerly of the USAF.
- Rick Castaneda - Works in the ESL program for Harrisonburg City Schools and also a member of the Hispanic Council of Harrisonburg.
- Andrew Clem - He runs a well-known conservative blog and a Professor of Foreign Studies at JMU.

I won't give away too much, but the round table was pretty well split into a more conservative contingent (myself/Clem) and a more liberal contingent (Jones/Castaneda). However, it managed to provide a good wealth of varying opinions, and it was a productive 25 minutes...I just wish it could have gone longer! Hopefully, we'll get to revisit this topic in the near future. All of the panelists were a pleasure to work with, even if we have different views.

While at the studios, I got to meet finnegan of hburgnews, another Shenandoah Valley area blog that I frequent often. Another class act. In fact, all of the people involved were class acts.

Andrew Clem also commented upon his experience on "Virginia Viewpoints".

Remember, "Virginia Viewpoints" will air on Tuesday, June 12th at 7:30 and 10:30 pm on WVPT.