In the last two years or so, top-tier editorialists have consistently expressed this opinion about our country: that we have become more narrow-minded in our political views and, as a result, our acceptance of people who are in some way different. While I wholeheartedly hope that such narrow-mindedness only seems to be on the rise because it makes for better news, of one other thing I am certain.

In the last 40 years or so, America has become much more open-minded toward vegetarians.About 40 years ago, I wanted to stop eating all animal products except fat-free dairy products and egg whites. My family doctor said, "Why in the world do you want to do that?" My parents said, "Not in our house."So the experiment began in earnest on my first day of college - even though the cafe usually offered only meat-based entrees for lunch and diner.When I asked to be exempt from the mandatory meal plan, my request was denied. Instead, I would be given a single 8-ounce container of Dannon yogurt any time the entrees didn't meet my satisfaction.Before I became an upperclassman, two coaches expressed concern about my diet, and I believe that the basketball coach judged me unfairly because of it.After college, in a follow-up, get-to-know-you interview - after a principal confided that I'd won the job - the superintendent asked how I ran my third half-marathon more than 13 minutes faster than my first one. A big part of that, I explained, came from losing unneeded upper-body muscle mass by tightening up my diet."What sort of a diet?""Lacto-ovo vegetarian," I said and watched his face drop. A few days later, a letter informed me that the district - in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch country - had given the job to someone else.But that was then and this is now. It's been at least a dozen years since I've been asked, "So how in the world do you get enough protein?" It's been at least two dozen since a buddy pointed at a pine cone and said, "Wanna stop for lunch?"But America's acceptance of vegetarians does not mean the country is being overrun by them. While the number has increased by about 330 percent since my start in 1979, fewer than four in 100 abstain from eating meat, fish, and poultry presently.Now if only three out of every 100 Americans were obese, there'd be no reason to remind you of the health benefits inherent in a vegetarian diet. But the obesity rate is more than 10 times that - and the overweight rate more than 20.Moreover, so many studies are linking a vegetarian diet to overall enhanced health that some mainstream medical associations are amending their positions on it. The most recent revision came from the Academy of Nutrition in Dietetics.Their new position paper appeared in the December issue of their journal and stated that when compared to other diets, a "well-planned" vegetarian diet not only reduces the risk of obesity, but also certain kinds of cancer, heart disease, and type two diabetes. Additionally, "appropriately planned" vegetarian diets benefit those of any age, and when the diet is adopted in childhood, it reduces the risk of long-term illness.The paper ends with this declaration: "If you could bottle up [the vegetarian diet] it would become a blockbuster drug overnight ... What other drug increases metabolism, lowers blood pressure, stabilizes blood sugar, and instead of increasing the risk for heart disease or diabetes stops it in its tracks?"While such a statement may sound like sensationalism, it's supported by slews of prior studies.A 2006 meta-study that analyzed 87 other studies concluded that vegetarian diets create reduced body weight. Prior to that, Dean Ornish, MD, author of Eat More, Weigh Less, found that patients who followed a low-fat, vegetarian diet lost an average of 24 pounds after one year. Better still, if the diet continued, the weight loss remained five years later.A 2001 study of a group of Seventh-Day Adventists who ate very little or no meat found that these males lived 7.28 more years than typical American males. Two years later, another study found that eating very little or no meat for two decades increased life expectancy by 3.6 years. In The Real Age Diet: Make Yourself Younger with What You Eat, Michael F. Roizen, MD, estimates that switching from the typical American diet to a vegetarian diet adds about 13 years to your life.Part of the reason for increased life span is that your risk of heart disease and diabetes drops significantly. In a 76,000-participant study cited at the Harvard Health Publications website, vegetarians reduced their risk for heart disease by 25 percent. After reviewing numerous diabetes-and-diet studies, the authors of the Academy of Nutrition in Dietetics position paper determined that a vegetarian diet reduces the risk of type two diabetes by 62 percent.