[T]he original book’s writer, Richard Hooker, has pointed out how much more liberal the lead character Benjamin “Hawkeye” Pierce is in the show than he was originally written in the original book and it’s sequel.
Although the series is definitely left-leaning, the M*A*S*H books were actually quite right-leaning and conservative. In the M*A*S*H sequel book, Hawkeye is portrayed as “kicking the bejesus out of lefties just to keep in shape”.
