Full disclosure time: I'm a Republican who spent years on Capitol Hill rolling my eyes at or altogether ignoring Rep. Dennis Kucinich. Several reasons for this. First of all, everyone was doing it, even the Democrats. Second, he's really short (so is that numbskull Tom Tancredo, by the way). Third, he was always offering amendments on genetically engineered food that I didn't understand or feel like researching. And finally, li'l D was absolutely bat-shit crazy, which is to say that he had a certain hippie-dippie vibe about him and rarely, if ever, expressed any interest in compromising his views for the sake of deal-making or ass-covering. Not even during that phase between late 2001 and late 2003 when most Democrats in Congress weren't really Democrats at all.