I was raised in Washington, DC in a household where one parent was a Republican and the other was a Democrat, so I got both sides.
I certainly did not know what the word 'socialism' meant growing up, because I was brought up in a very nonpolitical family. My brother was somewhat active, but my parents were not.
It always seemed to be a constant that my parents were political.
Certainly my parents were very political, so the whole Berlin Wall thing - and being a kid of the '80s - that's just something that's in your experience.
Like most conservatives, my path was a bit meandering. I grew up around people who mostly held conservative or libertarian views. The liberals I knew were fairly quiet about it, or at least I don't remember it being very heavy-handed.
I was raised a socialist by two very socialist parents, and I still feel very animated about socialist principles.
I grew up in a politically aware household: very civically-minded, good Minnesota liberals.
I suspect that had my dad not been president, he'd be asking the same questions: How'd your meeting go with so-and-so? . How did you feel when you stood up in front of the people for the State of the Union Address-state of the budget address, whatever you call it.
My parents had been involved in the labor movement; if we'd grown up in the city, we would have been red-diaper babies.
Combine a left-leaning upbringing with a family with direct experience of the Holocaust and someone with aspirations to write and I guess, sooner or later, that person will have a stab at writing something about the Holocaust.
I grew up in a world where the social democratic state was the norm, not the exception.
When I say I'm an authentic conservative, it's because when you look at who I am and where I come from, it'd be a lot easier to have grown up a Democrat.
I definitely care about what's happening in our country. I grew up in a family that was very liberal and had very strong opinions about liberal ideas. I was around those thoughts and had conversations about those things and did the best I could to absorb what was happening around me and have my own opinion about it.
I believe that white frame house is worthy of more than a nod of nostalgia, because the values President Clinton learned there and in Hope formed the core of his political philosophy.
I didn't grow up in public life. I lived with my mother in Boston, not in Washington, DC, so I was somewhat sheltered from that.
My parents were both Democrats and I grew up as a Democrat. Basically I was told that the Democrats were the party that cared about people. I liked people and I cared about them, so I was a Democrat.
I grew up in that world of power and politics in Washington, but when you grow up around it, you are completely unfazed by it.
My parents believed in the ideology of the Left. And being influenced by Marxism and Leninism theories, they chose Marlena as my second name.
Politics was sort of a way of life in our family.
It's the height of the Cold War, but I grew up in apolitical family and politics wasn't on the agenda.
I grew up in a very political household. My mum used to shout at the television. At Mrs. Thatcher.
If I went into politics, it's because I grew up in a political atmosphere.
My father was an engineer and my mother was a social worker, and they met as young socialists. That probably tells you everything you need to know about my attitude to money - I've never really been bothered about it.
When most kids were doing summer camp, I was doing the Arkansas festival circuit, passing out push cards, and shaking hands and tagging along with my dad to every nook and cranny in the state of Arkansas.
When I started out in public life there used to be a saying we'd hear from time to time, that every man who runs for public office will claim that he was born in a log cabin he built with his own hands. Well, my mother knew better. And she made sure I did too.
