It?s hard to imagine that happening today. Over the last 20 years (thank you, President Reagan), military service has reclaimed its rightful place of honor in our civic life. Even the most left-leaning critic of the war in Iraq takes great pains to praise our troops and note that he or she supports our men and women in uniform.
But attitudes can change -- and so can people. Michael certainly did, as we learn throughout ?Right Turns.? Consider how his perspective on the police changed. Like many liberals in the early 1970s, he viewed cops as ?racist thugs and sadistic bullies, the storm troopers of a repressive, intolerant regime.? But as part of some PR work that he was doing for a police recruitment campaign, he did ?ride-alongs? with some officers. He soon came to appreciate them as good, decent people who do the hard, dangerous and vital work of protecting law and order.
In time, Michael also found it hard to share the knee-jerk suspicion, if not blatant hostility, that many of his liberal friends displayed toward the notion of using American force to protect American interests. Many of them insisted that ?racist? America was no better, really, than the Soviet Union with which it was then locked into mortal combat. But this made no sense, Michael concluded:
By the end of 1973, such arguments not only struck me as unpersuasive but downright offensive. America?s flaws didn?t mean that our wonderful country, which had so abundantly blessed my family and countless others, deserved no support in its struggle to defend itself against Communist dictatorships committed to our destruction. The suggestion that people of goodwill couldn?t choose between an imperfect United States and the nightmarish brutality of the Soviet Union made as much sense as saying that a patient should express no preference between the prospect of contracting a common cold and developing colon cancer since both conditions involved some form of illness.
But ?Right Turns? is more than just a political odyssey filled with thought-provoking moments of self-discovery and family remembrances. It?s also a fun read. Anyone who ever watched Michael appear with Jeffrey Lyons on the film-review show ?Sneak Previews? will enjoy the anecdote-laden tour we get behind the scenes. Priceless, too, are Michael?s attempts to deliberately botch a job interview at a Wisconsin college he didn?t want to work for. (The school?s officials had offered to pay his travel costs from California, but only if he accepted the job or they turned him down -- not if he turned it down.)
I?ve got to hand it to Michael: Somehow, this straight shooter who refuses to mince words unfailingly comes across as gracious, reasonable and warm. And he can explain the liberal mindset better than most conservatives, because he was a liberal.
Now, with ?Right Turns? (available at his Web site, michaelmedved.com, and at Amazon.com), we have the engaging story behind that metamorphosis. Mazel tov, Michael -- and thanks.