Dennis and his 'radical truth'

History will recognize him as the man who sounded the alarm when the Bush administration moved America closer to the brink of disaster.

John Nichols wrote a short but powerful blog entry about Dennis Kucinich and his lonely road as the 'speaker of truth' in a time of lies and deceptions. (I noticed that Nichols posted it at 12:53 AM on the 16th. Apparently he doesn't sleep much either.)

Dennis has been on the right side of history and truth from the very beginning. He has a perfect track record: he spoke out against the war before it started, voted against the Patriot Act, spoke out against the privatization of Iraqi oil, has filed impeachment papers against Cheney, and is now warning of the Bush administration's attempts to bring the US closer to a state of open war with Iran.

Power to the Dennis.

Nichols:

Such is the case with Kucinich's appropriate answer to the latest move by the Bush-Cheney administration to ramp up hostilities with Iran. That move -- the unprecedented attempt to label Iran's 125,000-strong Republican Guard as a "specially designated global terrorist" group -- is, as the congressman says "nothing more than an attempt to deceive Americans into yet another war -- this time with Iran."

No one who has paid even the slightest attention to the Bush-Cheney administration's approach to Middle East affairs can doubt that Kucinich is right. Yet, his is a lonely voice of clarity amid the din of Democratic obfuscation that aids and abets this White House's worst instincts.

"The belligerent Bush Administration is using this pending designation to convince the American public into accepting that a war with Iran is inevitable," argues Kucinich.

"This designation will set the stage for more chaos in the region because it undercuts all of our diplomatic efforts," he adds. explaining that, "This new label provides further evidence for Iran's leaders that there is no point to engage in diplomatic talks with the United States if our actions point directly to regime change."

Delivering the response that should be coming from New York Senator Hillary Clinton, Illinois Senator Barack Obama and especially from Delaware Senator Joe Biden, who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when he isn't campaigning for president, Kucinich argued that, "Our nation is better served by demanding sensible and responsible diplomatic foreign policy initiatives from the Bush Administration."

Kucinich, who has proposed impeaching Vice President Cheney for continually prodding the country toward an unnecessary war with Iran, may not get the political credit he deserves for calling out this administration. But history will recognize him as the man who sounded the alarm when the Bush administration moved America closer to the brink of disaster.