He has been a military officer, college president, and an author and speaker on education and Western culture.

He was stationed at Fort Bragg, North Carolina; Vietnam; and West Point, where he was assistant professor of history and social sciences.

Bunting's 1972 novel The Lionheads was a scathing account based on his experiences as an officer of the 9th Infantry Division in Vietnam in 1968.

[3] The July 28, 1972 issue of LIFE magazine included a profile written by Thomas Moore of then Major Bunting examining his decision to leave West Point because of his desire to "disassociate [himself] from the active implementation of [the Army's] policy in Vietnam..." In the article Bunting also stated that he favored a "citizen draft and civilian control over the military" and that he didn't "want to see that son of a bitch who grows up in Greenwich, Conn., goes off to Yale and becomes a member of the Skull and Bones get out of doing some sort of national service."

In 2004, Bunting was appointed chairman of the National Civic Literacy Board of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute.