Late in 1971, Podhoretz's father died, “expectedly,” as he told Jacobson, “in the sense that he had been an invalid from emphysema for a long time, but unexpectedly in the sense that the end came very suddenly of a massive coronary.” During all these years he, Midge, and the children had visited his parents in Brooklyn on an almost weekly basis and, with his mother now a widow, such occasions, and often daily phone calls, became even more important.

The older girls, Rachel and Naomi, who were called Decter after their biological father but in every other way were Podhoretz's children, were now young adults. They had reached that stage more or less sound in mind and body because, as they both later admitted, he took his stepfatherly duties seriously. Midge said he “saved” them, indeed, for when countercultural temptations presented themselves – the usual drugs, sex, dropping out – she had initially been inclined to let nature take its course, while he understood that nature sometimes requires resistance and direction. Therefore he set limits, whether with regard to the hour at which the girls were to be back home or with regard to their need to finish homework before going out at all. As Rachel remarked, “They were liberal parents until I started doing certain things, at which point they discovered that they actually weren't liberal parents, and didn't want to be.