Both of my  parents were Kansas Republicans. I have a vague recollection of some low-level animosity toward FDR and I knew at the time that Dewey was the candidate for whom my parents voted ,  but, in general, politics and polemics of any kind were  not  part of my middle-class, middle-America life growing up. It was a typical *American*, small-town, church on Sunday, Jack Benny on the radio, ice cream socials in the summer, Saturday night movies in the main street theater, or the drive-in existence.