How I Accidentally Joined the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy : (and Found Inner Peace)

Rating:
Summary: Welcome to the VRWC
Review: Harry Stein, whose terrific baseball novel Hoopla I've long been a fan of, has written a very funny half polemic/half memoir about his own journey from Red-diaper baby to surprise member of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy. Stein wrote the Ethics column at Esquire for many years and, inevitably for someone addressing ethical concerns, had periodically stumbled into conservative positions, but as late as 1992 he volunteered for the Clinton campaign. The real turning point in his life came when his wife had their first child and announced, to his initial shock, that she would be staying home from now on to raise the baby. Nothing in the book is more revealing than the reaction of friends and colleagues to her decision. They were almost uniformly flabbergasted at, some were even hostile to, the idea that she might give up her career to be a full time mother. As is so often the case, when forced to examine political questions through the prism of parenthood, Stein too found his own views becoming increasingly conservative:

...something odd began to happen--mainly to the country, and incidentally to people like me. As feminism and multiculturalism more and more sought to remake society, attacking much that had served humanity well as narrow or even antique, we concluded we could no longer in good conscience remain on that side. There was both too little respect for the accumulated wisdom of the ages and too much playing havoc with truth and common sense. Indeed, many of us were soon startled to find ourselves tagged conservatives (and often worse) for holding firm to the old-fashioned liberalism: a bedrock commitment to fairness and individual liberty.

These nascent flickers of rightward leanings were soon fanned into a genuine conservative flame by both the spectacle of the Clinton Administration and, even more so, by the frequently vicious reaction that his rather mild apostasy provoked at the workplace, in his social circle, and from readers. He was brought face to face with one of the ugliest aspects of modern liberalism, the intolerance for dissenting opinion and the willingness to demonize anyone who strays from liberal orthodoxy. By the time of the impeachment scandal, Stein realized that he was no longer a liberal Democrat he had become a Republican, albeit a pretty moderate one.

Alongside the account of his political trek, Stein launches into short polemical riffs on issues like abortion, affirmative action, religious freedom, gay rights and so on. To anyone who follows Republican politics and the Conservative Movement, most of this will be familiar, perhaps too familiar, but Stein does bring the zeal of a convert and it's always fun to watch the scales fall from someone's eyes. The best stuff in these sections is his personal experience with political correctness, which adds immediacy to his tale, and a seminal theory on why the French love Jerry Lewis.

My one quibble with the book is the same as I had for William Henry's fairly similar In Defense of Elitism. Lingering pangs of liberal guilt lead Stein to attack certain easy targets on the Right, even though it's not terribly clear how he differs with them, and given his own evolving views it's really hard to see how the attacks make much sense. For example, though he remains relatively pro choice, he does say that he believes that the fetus is a living being. In the next breath though he attacks pro-life absolutists as unreasonable. My own views on abortion are not dissimilar to Stein's, but having conceded that abortion takes a life, I don't see how I can then turn around and say that those who oppose all abortions are being extremists. Their views are actually consistent, it is mine which are morally flaccid. I'm the one who supports taking a position for reasons of social expedience; who then am I to pretend to be morally superior to those who simply extend my own views to their logical ends? Of course it's still early days for Stein and as he gets acclimated over here on the Right one assumes he'll lose the psychological need to curry favor with former fellow travelers by dissing his new comrades.

At any rate, it's an immensely enjoyable book, one that I recommend heartily. Welcome to the Dark Side, Mr. Stein.

GRADE: A-

Rating:
Summary: I learned something from this book
Review: I have read a fair amount of contempoary conservative literature so an author does a great job when he/she teaches me something new. I have read books about political correctness on the campus ("Illiberal Education") and books on gender politics such as "Who Stole Feminism." I have often heard about the thought police on the campus but guess what? I never saw a discussion of which colleges and universities still foster free and open discussion. Stein, in his treatment of the issue of campus thoought control goes a step further than most authors in that after identifying some of the politically correct schools,he identifies some which swim against the tide and actually encourage open discussion and respect for tradition. Not surprisingly, University of Chicago rates highly in this regard. More surprisingly, Berkeley also gets high marks.

Stein is some what hampered by his own personal baggage. As the title implies, he is a former liberal who has changed. However, he has past issues to deal with. For example, both his wife and a former girlfriend have had abortions after he got them preganant so he discusses the issue while at the same time seeking to avoid being a hypocrite. It seems he wants to be pro life but can't be, so he discusses his new found respect for pro life activists while professing to remain pro choice.

All in all, I enjoyed the book, It is not one of the classics of conservative literature but I believe it's worth reading for its worthwhile insights.

Rating:
Summary: I Am Not Alone
Review: It's the tale of a good-hearted ex-hippie liberal journalist who kept thinking, questioning, and reading, and eventually comes to be on the right side of things. It's a story much like my own intellectual journey. I have never read a book faster. I highly recommend it for its deft prose, light style, and concise summation of arguments.

He tackles the cultural arena exclusively (whereas the economic side of things turns my crank more), and his targets are the fat easy ones (feminism, left-wing press bias, political correctness, affirmative action, etc), but he gets it so right, and he shows how and why he changed from his old views to his new ones, never losing his good heart or his decency; in fact, it is those qualities that drove him (and me) to reject the current left-wing agenda.

Liberals should read this not so much to have their minds changed (that takes more work than a single book can do) as to understand that most people who disagree with them also have pure motives and kind hearts.

Rating:
Summary: An Objective Political Assessment........Really
Review: Journalist and former radical liberal, Harry Stein, puts together a fine account of how life experiences changed his views and turned him into a conservative. Mr. Stein presents his beliefs with compelling evidence that would be difficult to argue against regardless of which side of the political spectrum you are on. Below is a brief list of topics he touches on:

1. Honor: Why has this become meaningless? Why do so many liberals view a man that cheats on his wife as someone who is just, "trying to find himself?"

2. The Media: How did it become so biased toward the left? Insider, Harry Stein, will tell you.

3. "Blame the Victim": A phrase directed at conservatives by liberals. But in certain instances, such as sexual promiscuity leading to STD's, are all "victims" 100% innocent? What about personal responsibility?

4. Sexgate: The Clinton scandal. Initially most liberals were outraged. But soon the liberal press made statements such as, "it's just between Hillary and Bill," or "let's just censure the guy and move on," and even "everybody does it." Do we no longer expect our President to set moral standards?

5. Feminism: Who doesn't support equal opportunity, a level playing field, and equal pay for equal work? But did the pendulum swing too far?

6. Higher Education: What ever happened to our colleges and universities mission to preserve and defend the essential truths of the past while providing a safe haven for open debate? How can we have open debate when we must be politically correct? Why do we now have "speech codes" designed to mute talk deemed insensitive?

7. Minority Conservatives: Why are these people so viciously attacked? Why is Clarence Thomas belittled for asserting his right to think for himself and refusing to have his ideas assigned to him because he is black? Is Colin Powel a trader to his race?

What Stein does surprisingly well is that he leaves out the bitterness and condescending attitude that most political authors draw on. He is actually quite complimentary toward many democrats, never insulting the person, only challenging the notion. This would be a terrific read for the conservative democrat, liberal republican, or anyone else who teeters with his or her own convictions.

Rating:
Summary: Enjoyable journey from Left to Right
Review: This is Harry Stein's account of how his political views changed over a longish period of time from liberal to conservative, and why. He describes how he gradually became disillusioned with feminism, , affirmitive action, political correctness etc, and his reasons for changing his opinions. It made me realise how ignorant I am about American current affairs, I hadn't even heard of approximately half the people mentioned in this book. Also, things like political correctness etc, don't seem to loom so large over here, we don't have any affirmitive action (yet), for instance. I can understand his position on abortion very well, it's more or less how I feel about the subject myself, with very mixed feelings. I occasionaly found myself surprised by some of his conclusions, for instance although he disaproves of many of the excesses of Political Correctness, he seems to have succumbed to Health Fascism, he mentions disaprovingly the casual attitude of the French towards smoking, which I regard as a point in their favour. Honestly, Mr Stein, whether you smoke or not, you're going to die anyway you know! I particularly enjoyed his scenario for a conservative sit-com set on a university campus, which seemed to me to have a lot of potential, could be almost as funny as 3rd Rock from the Sun. His children sound quite alarmingly mature for their age, being brought up by conservative parents seemed to have given them wisdom beyond their years, which is a good thing, I suppose. A bit unnerving to have about the house though. And this book introduced me to a brilliant quotation from Lincoln I'd never heard before, can't find the page now but it went something like "every time I hear someone argeu for slavery, I feel a wish to try it on them personally" Nice one, Abraham.