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.

That said, I'll now admit to admiring the guy's brazen and wholly atypical consistency as a politician, something of which I was reminded while watching him uncork this tub-thumper last night at the Democratic National Convention (above). Guy was bringing it exactly like this (or sometimes, interestingly, like this) back in the old days when Democratic wise people like Joe Biden and Hillary Clintonwere shining apples for the Bush administration and voting for the Patriot Act and the Iraq war. This particular speech is dedicated to Rep. Stephanie Tubbs-Jones, who represented a district adjacent to his until she passed away unexpectedly last week.