Naked City

Photo By John Anderson

The Dennis Kucinich presidential campaign touched down briefly in Austin Tuesday afternoon, to the strains of mariachi music and John Lennon's "Imagine" and an Airport Hilton welcome from several hundred enthusiastic locals. Austin, one of a dozen cities on the Cleveland congressman's "formal announcement" tour this week, was chosen because it is one of the "progressive centers of America," and Kucinich has already made several appearances in town during his many months of pre-formal campaigning as the most vocal progressive in the Democratic field.

Introduced by actress Mimi Kennedy of TV's Dharma & Greg and embraced by singer-songwriter Ani DiFranco ("He's the guy!"), Kucinich spoke only briefly and primarily about the U.S. war in Iraq. He proposed a peace plan to get U.S. troops out of Iraq by the new year, calling for the United Nations to assume control of all Iraqi oil revenues and reconstruction contracts for the public welfare of Iraq, and to help form a new Iraqi government independent of U.S. domination. "This is a moment in world history," said Kucinich, "that will allow us to change the direction of the world ... from war to peace."

Kucinich called on his congressional colleagues to reject the Bush administration's pending request for $87 billion in additional funding for its Iraq and Afghanistan adventures and warned that every Democrat who votes for the funds will be voting "for keeping our troops in Iraq, for a policy based on lies, and to ignore the past year of deception and failure to find any weapons of mass destruction." He soon had the audience chanting, "UN in, U.S. out!" and closed by describing his campaign as built upon "the expressive power of the heart," the basis of "a peace movement that will change the nature of politics in America."

Council Member Daryl Slusher, among the local officials greeting Kucinich, said that he had not yet chosen a candidate but came in support of Kucinich's "longtime progressive politics, his support for working people, and his activism for peace and for a U.S. Department of Peace." He said that right now Howard Dean and Wesley Clark seem to be the Democratic front-runners, but that Kucinich "could surprise a lot of people." Kucinich struck the same note in response to a question about national media coverage: "We're getting turnouts like this everywhere, we've got great support across the country, and many people will be surprised." he said. "But the people you saw here today will not be surprised."