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Growing up, politics was not an overpowering discussion at home, although it was discussed. My father is a West Point grad, and my mother spent 45 years as a social worker trying to help people. They had very different views of the world, but they were always careful to discuss things calmly and rationally.
Entering high school at the beginning of Reagan's second term, I was fairly conservative. I was encouraged to study more about various cultures around the world and started to discover more of the injustice in the world and quickly radicalized. To the best of my knowledge, I am still the only graduate of my high school (a private school known for turning out conservatives) to be a registered member of the Communist Party while a student.
Once in college I got the opportunity to study more Russian history, specifically Soviet history, and over the course of about 5 years grew completely disillusioned with Marxism in all its forms.
I've drifted closer and closer to the center, albeit from the left, because I see it as the only way to affect actual change. Where I once saw black and white, I only see grey. I am a firm disbeliever in absolutes of any sort, which I suppose means that the angry young man in me is gone, just like in Elvis Costello.
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"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - B. Franklin
"There ought to be limits to freedom." - George W. Bush
"We have met the enemy and he is us." - Pogo
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