Kucinich vs. Ron Paul

I have read a lot of people asking why Ron Paul is getting so much support but not Dennis Kucinich. After all, Kucinich's idea are not that much more "wacky" than PAul's, and he is also antiwar? Why the tremendous appeal of Paul to conservatives (and perhaps some liberal crossovers) but no such appeal for Kucinich?

I think there are several reasons, but the primary one is that Dennis Kucinich is not really to the Democrats what Paul is to the GOP. Kucinich is more like their Tancredo, a more purified. distilled version of what hte other Democrats believe, or claim to.

All of the Democrats in the race are antiwar or pretend to be (you can determine who you think is which for yourselves). At best, Kucinich can claim to be the more genuine liberal, sort of a reverse of Alan Keyes in 2000. Dissatisfied Democrats can still get a half-loaf with the other candidates with a better chance of winning.

But on the single most important issue of the last few years, the Iraq War, Ron Paul is the only candidate to speak up for the right wing antiwarrior. People who cannot stomach the Democrats but who want a humble foreign policy have only one choice. Listening to Paul at a Republican debate is far more electrifying than listening to Kucinich, because he stands against the entire pack of competitors.

Kucinich and Paul? Kucinich is, as far as I can tell, a good and sincere person, albeit one whose ideas are far more left-wing than mine. But he is not the Democratic version of Paul.

That is all.