At 24, I worked for George McGovern’s 1972 Presidential effort, managing the campaign in what was then the 52nd Assembly District in Los Angeles County. This was the most conservative Democratic district in California and likely favored both Hubert Humphrey and George Wallace over the nominee. In 2005, I had the opportunity to interview him for an hour with the release of the documentary, One Bright Shining Moment: The Forgotten Summer of George McGovern.

GEORGE McGOVERN was a decorated World War II bomber pilot (his wartime exploits were at the center of of Steven Ambrose’s The Wild Blue) and professor at Dakota Wesleyan Univeristy. After running the Food for Peace Program under John Kennedy, he represented South Dakota for two terms in the House and three terms in the Senate. His opposition to the Vietnam War fueled a grassroots campaign that won him the 1972 Democratic presidential nomination, only to lose to incumbent Richard Nixon in one of the great landslides in US history. Many members of Nixon’s Committee to Re-Elect the President later served jail time for Watergate-connected crimes.

In 1997, Bill Clinton named him the US Permanent Representative to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, and in 2000 Clinton awarded him the nation’s highest honor, the Medal of Freedom. He has written nine books including Terry: My Daughter’s Life and Death Struggle with Alcoholism (about his daughter who died in 1994), The Essential America: Our Founders and the Liberal Tradition, and Ending Hunger Now: A Challenge to Persons of Faith.