This opinion post is related to the poll:
Twenty-eight years ago today, 31-year-old Dennis Kucinich, then the youngest-ever mayor of a major American city, famously pushed Cleveland into economic default rather than capitulate to the demands of a group of bankers eager to gobble up the city’s power plant.
Today, as Kucinich kicks off his White House bid, he speaks to Truthdig about a stand of integrity that nearly cost him his political career, but which has striking relevance in the current political landscape—where such integrity seems in short supply.
He says:
And I’ll tell you something: I knew at that moment, I knew absolutely, that my career was on the line. I knew that if I refused to sell, the banks would put the city of Cleveland into default and I would likely lose the next election because people wouldn’t understand what happened. But any of us have to decide at some point in our lives what we stand for—whether we have integrity, whether we really believe that there is such a thing as a government by the people, of the people and for the people.
He also explains what went through his mind when he made the decision that would define his career:
How much people pay for electricity is no small matter. For some people, it is a real hardship to be able to meet the monthly electric bill, gas bill, telephone bill. I remember when I was growing up in Cleveland, standing in a hallway, listening to my parents count the pennies to pay the electric bill. I can still hear the pennies dropping—click, click, click—on our old chipped, white and metal table.
So I was sitting in a board room with the head of Cleveland’s largest bank, Cleveland Trust, and he was telling me that unless I agreed to sell Cleveland’s municipal electric system to the Cleveland Electric Illumination Co., which had many relationships with the city’s banks, he was not going to renew the city’s credit.
And all the time I’m thinking about my parents, back when I was a child. I’m hearing them counting the pennies. I’m hearing “click, click, click,” and this banker is telling me, “You had better sell, or we’re putting this city into default.” And I’m thinking of my folks and everybody like them, to whom it matters what they pay for electricity, to whom it matters that there’s somebody standing by, defending their interests—even if they don’t know about it. For me this was a moment that brought together everything I ever believed in.
Meanwhile, at wikipedia, we can read:
Kucinich's supporters say that Kucinich kept his campaign promise of refusing to sell Muny Light to CEI and was brave for not giving in to big business. In fact, in 1993, then-Cleveland Mayor Michael White cited Kucinich's "wisdom" in not selling the utility. In 1998 the council honored him for having the "courage and foresight" to stand up to the banks and saving the city an estimated $195 million between 1985 and 1995.[7]
See also Wikipedia's article on the 1977-78 Mayoral administration of Dennis Kucinich.