I have to say I never really paid that much attention to Dennis Kucinich until the last debate. In 2004, when Kucinich was also a candidate, I was a Howard Dean guy who with the greatest reluctance got behind the "electable" John Kerry, so I never really paid much attention to Kucinich.
This time, I find myself able to only support one candidate, and that is Dennis Kucinich. Because he's the only one speaking the damn truth. You know when you've been bullshitted on for so long -- pissed on and told it's raining -- and when your own party leaders refuse to call the piss what it actually is, and refuse to even acknowledge that you and everybody else is drowning in piss -- when somebody comes alng and simply speaks the truth. The truth! It's a very simple thing, really, the truth. It's pure, it cuts like sunlight through the fog, and it tastes like the freshest, coldest water on a hot dirty day. Instead of like piss.
The truth. Kucinich is the only one speaking it.
And right now he's saying what nobody else will say, except people like us, here in blogland: The Democratic "leaders" promises in 2006 to end the Iraq war were a TOTAL FRAUD.
Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich said Wednesday the vow from his party's leadership in Congress to stand up to President Bush on ending the war in Iraq amounts to a "total fraud."
The Ohio congressman said the most recent House-passed plan to set a timetable for ending the war still would permit permanent bases in Iraq and allow Americans soldiers to train Iraqi military and police and to fight off insurgents.
"This is a fraud, a total fraud, and it breaks the promise the Democrats made to the voters that we would get out of Iraq," Kucinich said of his own party's congressional leadership during an interview Wednesday.
"They want to be on all sides of the issue. Instead of getting out of Iraq, we are getting in deeper," Kucinich said.
Thanks, Dennis. It's very simple, direct, and devastatingly honest. Why is that so difficult for someone to say? WHY is it such a big deal to call a spade a spade? WHY is impeachment "off the table" for the most reckless, dangerous, and sociopathic president the United States has ever had?
It feels good to hear a simple truth from someone running for President, doesn't it?
Or, as he said, regarding the flip-flopping of so many of the candidates: Wouldn't it be nice to have a President who was right the first time?
Dennis Kucinich is making the rest of the Democratic candidates look like a bunch of mealy-mouthed phonies.
He's also doing something that's quite revolutionary as well: It's called "leadership". What is "leadership"? Well for those who have been watching Democratic politicians for the last eight years or so, you've may have forgotten, so here it is:
It's when you take action that nobody else is taking, that will inspire others to follow you.
What leadership is NOT is sticking your finger in the wind, having polls done, finding out what the misguided, misinformeod people already think and then following that. That's what most Democrats do.
Kucinich actually realizes that you actually can't LEAD and FOLLOW at the same time. Imagine that!
So he's leading:
State Rep. Betty Hall, D-Brookline, said she decided to endorse Kucinich after watching him unsuccessfully pursue impeachment charges against Vice President Dick Cheney.
"I was inspired by his boldness and tence," Hall said at a news conference in Manchester.
(snip)
"It isn't popular to speak up; I know. When I spoke in the Legislature, some people were angry, but we must talk about it. We must learn about it," Hall said.
I have no choice but to support Dennis Kucinich in the primary (I'm in California). I cannot vote for any other Democrat, because most of them NOT using their positions to actually LEAD anybody. Kos has called out Hillary and Obama especially for failing us so profoundly in this regard. Dodd is better and would probably be my second choice, but where is he calling a spade a spade? Where is he calling out the President and Cheney and the other gang of pirates as the criminals they are? Where is the OBVIOUS need for justice here?
Nature abhors a vacuum. Our politicians in Washington, our Democratic "leaders" who pissed me off so much I left the party, have created one enormous gaping vacuum so wide you could walk an army of Ron Pauls through it.
Kucinich is the only one I've seen who seems the least bit interested in simply speaking the truth, and you can't deal with your problems until you acknowledge WHAT THEY ARE IN THE FIRST PLACE. America right now is like an alcoholic who refuses to admit they have a problem. They're going to the Dr. for everything else -- liver problems, obesity, those nasty varicose veins in the nose, bad breath, everything BUT the fact that they're a goddamn alcoholic.
Thanks, Kucinich, for speaking the truth, because you speak for the millions of us who have been driven to these blogs because of the maddening frustration of seeing nobody in positions of responsibility -- the people who SHOULD be telling the truth -- the people whose JOB it is to tell the truth, and whose responsibility to millions of people they represent is to tell the truth -- have all FAILED.
I honestly don't see how you can vote for anybody else at this point. I don't want to criticize anybody else's candidate, because I think they're all equally guilty and equally to blame.
How many of the candidates have called Bush and Cheney the criminals we all know they are? How many of called for their impeachment? How many have admitted that invading Iraq was a crime?
I know if I killed a million people I'd be in jail.
I know if I told lies about my neighbor in order to justify burning down his house I'd be in jail.
I know if I stole a few tanker trucks worth of gasoline for my buddies to sell I'd be in jail.
I know if I helped my friends shut down electric power in an entire state, in order to extort money, I'd be in jail.
Let's put the murderous lawbreakers in jail where they belong. Let's end the rape of Iraq and quit talking about how we can "succeed" at the rape. It's a goddamn rape; there's no succeeding at a rape. Let's just back off and apologize already. Let's quit telling lies and admit we have a problem. And start fixing it.
And most important of all, and what this diary is really about:
Let's reward those who tell the truth. And show the rest of them, the followers, that if they follow us, we'll reward them too.