RICHMOND -- The same issue that drew Rod Driver into politics as a young man more than a half century ago compels him to try a fourth time to be elected to Congress.

Driver, 74, an independent, wants to be U.S. representative from the 2nd Congressional District. Its always been for 54 years now my obsession with human rights and peace-and-war issues, Driver said during a visit to his home recently. I get obsessed and angry when my country, my government, is spending my money hurting other people, which is what I see happening.

Just as he opposed past conflicts involving American troops, Driver is vehement in his criticism of the war in Iraq. He blames President Bush, and also Congress, claiming they sold America a bill of goods.

The Iraq war was based on lies, states the opening paragraph of his orange-and-blue brochure. So the cost in money, lost liberties and especially human suffering is inexcusable. Unless Congress says no more and starts impeachment proceedings, we can forget the Constitution.

Driver, who served four terms as a state representative and who ran unsuccessfully for Congress in 1998 (as a Republican), 2000 (as an independent) and 2002 (as a Republican) says his passion for politics began when he was at the University of Minnesota, where he earned a bachelor of science degree in electrical engineering in 1953.

My first [major] political campaign was for Dwight Eisenhower, back in 1952. He said hed end the Korean War. So I got involved.

Driver believes that party affiliation has little bearing on what he sees as Americas misguided foreign policy.

In the Vietnam days, it was [Democratic Presidents] Kennedy and Johnson. More recently, [Republican President] Nixon. Both Bushes, former President George H.W. Bush and his son, both Republicans. So how would he, running this time as an independent, change the establishment?

If I were elected, I would be one of the noisiest people in Congress. Absolutely this is the issue. How in the world can we carry on with day-to-day activities as though we arent doing these things were doing in other parts of the world, Iraq being the prime example today?

What right do we have? There were no weapons of mass destruction, no connection to 9/11, and [President] Bush has admitted both of those facts now. But he still says, I did the right thing.

Driver is running against incumbent Rep. James R. Langevin, a Democrat. There is no Republican in the race. While war may top the list of Drivers issues, he has several others:

Health care. Driver maintains that the unbounded growth in the costs of health care must be contained before they bankrupt the economy. He blames insurance companies and lack of oversight of bills that providers send them.

Education. A former professor, Driver favors stricter standards for teachers.

Campaign finance. Huge campaign contributions to incumbent congresspersons make it difficult for a challenger to compete, Driver says in his brochure. There may be no solution to this threat to democracy short of public financing of campaigns a difficult goal to achieve.

Energy. Driver favors alternative sources of energy to combat high gasoline and heating oil prices and to reduce environmental pollution. He would achieve these goals through greater conservation and tax incentives for use of renewable sources.

And with energy, at least, Driver puts his money where his mouth is. The little red car parked in his driveway thats a 13-year-old, three-cylinder Geo, which, Driver says, gets 50 miles to the gallon. It has no energy-draining air conditioner, although it does have a radio. It would work if I fixed the antenna, the candidate says.

The house that he and his wife, Carole, built in 1979 is solar-heated. Driver explains the system on a tour: the 600-square-foot solar panels on the roof of the south-facing front, the tubes that carry heated water into two massive concrete tanks that, with their 8,000 gallons, take up much of the basement. Driver has used no heating oil or natural gas since moving into the house. A wood stove takes the chill off the coldest winter days.

Born in London, the child of an English mother and an American father, Driver earned a masters degree in electrical engineering in 1955, the year that he married. In 1960, Driver earned a doctorate in mathematics in 1960. After working at the Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque, N.M., Driver was hired in 1969 by the University of Rhode Island, where he taught mathematics until his retirement in 1998. The Drivers have three children and six grandchildren.

Driver is getting his message out through bumper stickers, brochures, a few signs and billboards, appearances and debates, a Web site (www.roddriver.com), and TV ads. Hes largely self-financed. Ive got about $11,000 contributed by friends and I havent even asked for money. It doesnt really work for me. Im no good at raising money its always a matter of what can I take out of my retirement accounts to run a campaign.

According to his October newsletter, Driver has invested $150,000 of his savings in his campaign. A good chunk of that has gone into his two TV ads. One of them summarizes his education, his URI professorship, and his eight years in the General Assembly. He fought powerful forces in Rhode Island government, the voiceover says. His home, built 27 years ago, is solar-heated and his car gets 50 miles per gallon. Rod Driver. Hell make the difference in Congress.

The second ad concerns his prime issue, war. He plays it for a visitor on his living-room TV. The ad opens with an image of President Bush and a slogan: No more wars based on lies. Mr. Bush is heard saying, Nobodys ever suggested that the attacks of September 11 were ordered by Iraq, and then Drivers voice cuts in: Thats the man who told us Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. And he convinced Americans that Iraq attacked us on 9/11. More than 100,000 people have died in Iraq.

Watching it now, on the heels of a report in the British medical journal The Lancet that claims that 655,000 Iraqis have died since America invaded Iraq, Driver exclaims: Boy is that old!

The TV Driver continues: and were going to spend a trillion dollars on that war. Yet Congressman Langevin votes against even having an exit strategy. We need new decision-makers in Congress. Im Rod Driver.