Sen. Frist spent quite a while pressing palms in the exhibition area after doing a radio interview (“radio row” is in the exhibit hall just as the bloggers are).

What was quite cool is that he came over to talk to the bloggers and encouraged us to ask questions. He was quite personable and didn’t rush us — he must have spent 10 minutes or more with the four of us (Mick from Mainstreet Journal, Rob from VOLuntarily Conservative and Adam from Tennessee Politics Blog).

Not being a journalist, this was my first opportunity to toss a question at a political figure in a professional capacity. And this wasn’t just any politician; the Senate Majority Leader dictates what legislation can come for a vote and what dies. He is arguably the most powerful man in the world. Yet strangly enough, I didn’t quite gibber like Dean on crack.

It was noisy so I couldn’t catch all that went on, but Mick
started with a question about Frist’s blogging activity. The Senator responded with a very reasoned answer about blogging changing political communication and conversation (I’m sure Mick will do a better job at reporting his answer — I was still a little awestruck).

Mick then jumped in with a question about the Patriot Act and the inclusion of a crackdown on domestic methamphetine production. The Senator talked about how it is a growing problem that is “ravaging a generation”. He admitted that the legislation could have been passed as a separate bill but that it needed to pass. [As Rob noted later, we always complain when Dems stick unrelated legislation onto bills so why should we do it too?]

During his answer he mentioned the Dubai situation, so I asked him what he thought about Dubai Ports World selling their American control to an American company soley because they were American. I don’t think that the Senator heard the implied critisism in the question (there was a lot of background noise) and replied that he had encouraged DPW to do so.

I followed up by asking if foreign ownership of port operations was going to be reviewed at other ports, given that the majority are operated by foreign interests, including China. The Senator admitted ignorance of the issue, saying he couldn’t respond because he didn’t have the background.

Gee, Senator, if foreign ownership of port operations is a concern because an Arab ally is involved, shouldn’t it also be a concern if a hostile near-superpower is involved? I was more than a little disappointed with his answer.

He then moved down the table and talked to Rob and Adam. I admit to not having caught any of that conversation.

I wish that I had had a recording device so I could more accurately reflect the verbiage as well as the tone of his answers (which were much longer than the distilled version that I have pulled from my memory). Even if I didn’t like all of his answers, talking to the Senator was a very pleasurable experience and his staff was unbelievably nice.

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