"I'm for the little fellers, not the Rockefellers." - Sen. Paul Wellstone

Shortly before he died in a mysterious airplane crash 11 days prior to the 2002 elections, Minnesota Senator Paul Wellstone met with Vice President Dick Cheney, probably the Bush administration's most evil public face.

Cheney was rounding up Senate support for the October 2002 vote on giving the administration carte blanche to invade Iraq, with or without blessing from the United Nations. Cheney strong-armed opposing politicians like the most vindictive of mafioso leaders, and opponents usually gave in.

But not Wellstone. Whatever you thought of his progressive brand of politics, he wasn't a wimp. And that's what made him more than dangerous in the eyes of people like Cheney.

At a meeting full of war veterans in Willmar, Minn., days before his death, Wellstone told attendees that Cheney told him, "If you vote against the war in Iraq, the Bush administration will do whatever is necessary to get you.