Too short to win.
Purely a ‘try to influence the discussion’ campaign.
Too lefty to sway most folks. More power to him. Maybe he, Sharpton and Moseley-Braun can have their own debate.
Hell, I was a teenager in Cleveland when he was the “Boy Mayor” (29 yrs old, as I recall), and he acted really crazy and pissed everyone off, and it became the first big U.S. city to go broke!
I thought he was just GREAT, but I was 16 then. I suppose if I’d had a wife and children and a mortgage I would have felt differently about him. And I haven’t really followed his career since 1978, when I blew that pop stand.
I’ve met him.
I agree, he doesn’t have big money backing so can’t win.
But Ralph Nader praised him, so I certainly like him.
I lived in NE Ohio when he was Clevelands boy mayor. Aside from the fact that he damn near led the city into bankruptcy, and helped turn the city into a national joke, I have nothing against him.
Seriously, he’s a far left idiot.
Hey - Clevelander all of my life. The city went bankrupt only because the banks called in the city loans, and THAT happened because Kucinich wouln’t be their bitch. I’m over-simplfying the case, of course…
If he’s going to have a remotely successful run - and I know this is petty but its how people will think - he needs to stop dying his hair jet black. It just looks so WRONG!
Patty
Kucinich has several problems. One is that he’s spent almost his entire adult life in politics. Another is that his anti-abortion stance, combined with his fiscal liberalism, is no good in getting the socially liberal/fiscally conservative female vote that the Dems have been needing badly over the last few years. Finally, there is his record. Over his career (especially in the 1970’s), he had a good time pissing off the African-American population of Cleveland. (The reason he lost his bid for re-election as Mayor in 1979, in fact, is because a majority of black votes went to Voinovich).
The question is, will he also run for his House seat, and, if not, who will?
Didn’t you hear?
He’s changed his views on abortion.
I’m sorry i don’t have a cite, but someone ven wrote to the Plain Dealer complaining that he changed for political reasons.
I found that out too, when I went to the Plain Dealer website a few minutes after making my post.
I honestly think that this may hurt Kucinich. This audience is a hard-core one, one that resists any shifting in views in order to get more votes. Now, if he’ll switch his long-held views on abortion in order to gain a few more votes, what else will he change?
(In addition, if he plans on running for re-election, he’ll have no chance as an abortion rights supporter on the West Side of Cleveland.)
Native Clevelander here. Regretting that I left Dennis’s district for ultra-Republican Virginia. I love him. He’s one of the few people in the government, perhaps the only one, I think is great. You mean people are still giving him shit about his term as mayor? Wake up, that was 25 years ago! Dennis “The Menace” has matured and learned a lot since then. He’s learned from his mistakes and grown as a human being and as a statesman. For all that I like him, and desperately long for someone to give the election a tug toward the left, I don’t want to see him give up his seat.
I understand him because I also grew up ethnic Catholic in Cleveland and appreciate the set of values the Church instills in you: a wholesale ethic of life (against capital punishment and nuclear bombs as well as abortion) and helping the disadvantaged. And you have to be from Cleveland, city of the Cultural Gardens, to know the importance of ethnic Catholics in that city’s local character. (Dennis is Croatian.) It’s something that isn’t easily pigeonholed into the stereotypical “liberal” vs. “conservative” dichotomy. Still, Dennis is the boldest, most fearless leftist in the whole United States government and I’m glad to see him gaining prominence and a wider audience.