I got to meet Colorado Congressman Tom Tancredo tonight. We had our makeup done together. He was on CNN and I was on after him on MSNBC.

We chatted very amiably for over a half hour. I told him I thought he looked very good (posture and clothes) in the Republican debates, and although I’ve never agreed with anything he’s ever said, I think it’s pretty cool he’s taken his quest for the Republican nomination as far as he has.

I did try to ask him some serious questions. Does he read blogs? Never. His campaign had a blogger who was terrific but he went back to college. He gets news clips with articles about himself every day. He knows bloggers write negative things about him and he has no interest in reading them.

Does he have a favorite for the Republican nomination if he’s not the candidate? No.

He thinks too many of the presidential candidates arrive at their position on issues by listening to what focus groups say instead of having any real ideology. (I’m going to respect his privacy and not disclose his comments on individual candidates.) He thinks the Republicans will have a hard time in November ’08. Right now, he can’t imagine who he’d vote for (but he assured me it wouldn’t be for Hillary.)

I thanked him for sponsoring the bill to keep Dog the Bounty Hunter from getting extradited to Mexico. He said he’s a big fan of Dog’s. He didn’t know anything about him before seeing his tv show.

His son, who’s in college, shares his politics.

He does travel to Mexico. He has no problem with Mexico. He doesn’t think the Mexican government would stand for Americans coming in without visas and he respects them for that. He said the media in Mexico is much more aggressive than our’s.

I could hear his CNN segment from the makeup room. Listening to what he said — he was arguing that two kids who have been here since they were two years old should not be allowed to attend college here and should be deported — I just shook my head. How can a person who seems so normal and friendly have such backward ideas? Then again, I’m sure he’d say the same thing about me.

And, since he didn’t make fun of the rollers in my hair or tease me that it took three times as long for my makeup as it did for his, I’m not going to say anything critical about him tonight. Tomorrow might be another story.

[Cross-posted at TalkLeft.com]