There is ONE candidate for the Democratic Presidential Nomination, who has genuinely progressive positions on all the major issues.

1. He was opposed to the Iraq war from the start, and voted AGAINST all appropriations for it and other supporting measures. He advocates immediate, complete withdrawal of all US forces.

2. He advocates a single-payer, universal health care program (with NO involvement with insurance companies), similar to that in most other industrialized countries.

3. He is opposed to the globalization measures and organizations (NAFTA, CAFTA, WTO, IMF, etc.) that are ruining the lives of the most impoverished Americans, and also wrecking the careers of middle class Americans, via "guest worker" programs, the offshoring of jobs and the importing of vast quantities of goods produced by people being paid a fraction of US wages and salaries. (These measure are ALSO ruining the lives of people in other countries like small Mexican farmers.) All this is for the benefit of the wealthiest people here and abroad.

4. He vigorously opposed the Patriot Act and all other measures degrading our civil liberties.

5. He is a strong advocate of real measures to deal with our growing environmental problems.

He also has excellent positions on civil rights, women's rights and even on e-voting.

Note that on ALL of the above issues, his views are not only progressive, but are views that polls indicate are strongly supported by the US population in general.

This mystery candidate, who is rarely mentioned in the media, is DENNIS KUCINICH.

Mike Gravel is also a real opponent of the Iraq war. But NONE of the other candidate calls for a real end to the war. ALL proposals by the Democratic leadership and by the other candidates includes an escape clause saying that it would be OK to leave US troops in Iraq for the purposes of, "the protection of U.S. personnel and infrastructure, specific counterterrorism operations, and assistance with the training and equipping of Iraqi forces." These, of course are exactly what US troops in Iraq are supposed to be doing there NOW.

None of the other candidates have positions resembling items 2-4 above, and their positions on the environment are all weaker than those of Kucinich.

People who call themselves progressives should be vigorously supporting Dennis Kucinich in every way possible, including campaign contributions. Check out his website:

http://www.dennis4president.com/home/