I wish I could just ask him to have yea with me, because in case I ever do meet him it'll probably take me an hour to get over "oh God, are you real?" hahaha. I'm such a fan girl. 
King is a fantastic storyteller. Literary historians of the future, if they're honest, will probably rank him along with Dickens -- both were prolific, both were immensely popular, both have had numerous films made from their works (Dickens had stage plays first, of course).
I'm rereading the story again. To be fair, his lead character, Jake Epping, is a thirtysomething when the story begins in 2010 (?). So he probably would have those attitudes toward the late Fifties-early Sixties. I don't recall if King gives those attitudes to other, "native" 1950s-60s characters that Jake encounters.
Lee,
Benzadmiral, on reflection, I have to admit that you are right. I think the difficulty is that King writes for the popular audience, and thus his main characters must have some of the assumptions of the audience members, in order to be believable. I have to keep reminding myself that my own views are eccentric, not to say reactionary, and not those of a thirty-something. In all fairness to King, I thought the story was a good idea, and well told in general; he certainly did his research about LH Oswald, didn't he? What I did notice was that in the early chapters the residents of the town in Maine tend to come off as local comic characters rather than as three-dimensional people, apart from the Janitor and his family. But a good plot, nonetheless.
