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I wonder sometimes� if I had been born in, say, South Dakota or Alabama� how likely is it that I would be a conservative now?

This is not to say that I grew up in a liberal/Democrat area. I most certainly did not. But I did spend my first ten years in an international culture. The suburbs outside New York City are as melty a melting pot as you're going to find. There were always kids in my class straight off the boat from anywhere from Italy to Haiti; some of them arrived not yet speaking any English but grinning the big wide grin of a terrified kid who's been told to do whatever the nuns tell him to.

Then we moved to a more affluent beach community, and the atmosphere changed. Where my parents live now is overwhelmingly Republican. I don't remember having many political thoughts until college, though, and at that point I was in another cultural fondue pot.

There's a questionable connection I'm drawing here�does being surrounded by people of different cultures make a person more liberal? Not necessarily, I guess.

Still, I wonder if it was those first ten years, or the college years, or just something innate that made me turn away from the conservative views that a lot of my childhood acquaintances have ended up with.

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