The question of what makes a presidential candidate serious is easy for some people to answer. Look at the polls. Is the candidate in the top two or three? No? Not serious.

But early polling is too often everybody’s guesses as to what other people think. Hardly determinative. To deny that the media has no play in this — with how journalists focus in on one or two candidates, to the general ignoring of the rest, and how they avoid a few like the plague — would be dumb.

But this is Common Sense time, folks. We aren’t in the manufacturing of a mandate business — the game that the media takes way too seriously. It is our job to consider all the presidential candidates. So what about the two bright lights among the dark horses, Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul?

Both are interested in ideas. Some very different ideas, but ideas nonetheless. And both have principles. Both admire the Constitution of the United States. I just saw a video of Kucinich pulling out a pocket copy of the Constitution from his coat. He is known for bringing up that inconvenient document at the oddest of moments. You know, like when principles are called for.

It turns out these two men on the opposite sides of the aisle actually trust each other. They’ve worked together. Kucinich has even talked about Ron Paul as a running mate.

Serious journalists might want to ignore these two. Serious citizens should not.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.