My Precocious Interest in Politics: WWII and Cold War

Megan McArdle links to a post describing teenagers ignorance of Osama bin Laden. She says:

 I didn't know what Iran Contra was when I was in high school, and I was a sophomore when it happened.  Teenagers live in their own little world, only tangentially connected to the one the rest of us occupy.

Now she is sharp and interested in politics, but that experience contrasts sharply with my own experience.  Her commenters tend to agree, though some report early interest in politics. Personally I can remember opining pompously to a classmate about the possible successor to Stalin (at age 12-3?) and sitting on a panel to discuss current events in fourth grade.

Part of my early interest was aspirational; I was surrounded by older people whose opinions I valued and needed to keep up with the times.  I also had an elder sister who enjoyed the role of pedant. 

But part of it was likely the times: we'd come out of WWII and emerged into the Cold War, with the USSR getting the atomic bomb, and the arms race.  So current events were much hotter then than now, or even in the 1980's when McArdle was a youth.