I guess today, the first time I ever saw him, I knew him as a movie critic, but he'd been a best-selling

author for years before that, American history expert, longtime conservative talk radio host.

In a way, when you get to know his history, he's like an intellectual forest gump, and I mean it

this way. His life seems to intersect with major political and entertainment figures throughout the

decades. I mean, he worked for the Robert Kennedy campaign, and he was at the hotel that night

that Robert Kennedy was assassinated in 1968. His study partner at Yale was Hillary Clinton. He hung

out with Barbara Streisand. That's kind of the turning point for him to start to go, maybe I'm

a conservative. He became friends with Dick Cheney during the Ford administration. He co-hosted

the PBS movie review show was started by Siskel Iniber. As a young man, Democratic Party loyalty,

he was a pretty hardcore Democrat. And if he had continued along that track, he probably would have

been a big star on the left, but he had a six-week experience that'll let him tell you about that

put him on a very different political path. One that he never thought capable of traveling,

and that eventually led him to the world of talk radio where in the last 23 years his show is

consistently been one of the most listened to programs in the nation. He is a sharp cultural

critic who is not afraid to take his own side when necessary. He'll take it on and he has,

and it's made him unpopular at times and very popular other times, but he lets the chips fall

where they may. The left has never really learned this over the last few years, but if you get into

an argument with this guy, you're probably going to lose, but he is decent and civil all the way

along. He's written or co-written 14 books, many of the best sellers, his latest is God's Hand on

America. It's the kind of subject matter that makes everybody on the left squirm, but remember,

his Yale train. So he's got the credentials to back it up and the history to back it up. It

traces some of the most remarkable coincidence and astounding events of American history that are

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