Dennis Kucinich is a remarkable human being. He was born to Cleveland, Ohio’s working class poor. He was a sickly, undersized child who suffered from asthma, stuttering and agonizing stomach pains. His extended family was plagued with poverty, cruelty, insanity and alcoholism.
“Mind over matter” was his childhood mantra.
As he says in his new autobiography, The Courage to Survive , his passage from pain to joy has come through love, hope, friendship and a spiritual awakening.
By age 13, Dennis had become a 97 lb. third string high school varsity quarterback. By age 30, he was the mayor of Cleveland, disparagingly referred to as “Dennis the Menace” due to his refusal to sell Cleveland’s publicly owned electric utility. In 1996, he became Congressman Kucinich. In 2004 he would first run for President of the United States. In the 2008 Democratic primaries, this American working class hero is again the most progressive candidate running