I treated myself today to a long browse at Powell’s downtown. I walked out with two books, neither of which I had on my radar going in. I noticed after I left that the two books had a something in common: They are both books about American intellectuals who at various times in their lives took positions that didn’t align with their initial ideologies. In the case of education expert Diana Ravitch, her views morphed from conservative to liberal over her adulthood. In the case of Hitchens, who is one of my real intellectual heroes, he was a loud supporter of America’s war in Iraq, despite his position leading up to the war as a staunch leftist. He didn’t become a conservative, but he took a controversial position that rankled many on the Left that previously tended to agree with him.