Bush & Company

Buddy Roemer, a former Democratic congressman and Republican Louisiana governor, is running for president, but few people know it. One reason is that he's never been invited to participate in the debates, perhaps because he's such a sensible and honorable man. How he'd show up the other candidates! Funding his campaign solely with individual contributions of $100 maximum, he disdains the anonymous, pernicious Super PACSs.

"The biggest threat to our country is corruption," he told Rachel Maddow on January 6.

"I've got to get on the debates," he said. " I've been shut out of every darn one and I wonder why."

Mr. Roemer is waging war for campaign reform, against money in politics. He's voiced vehement disapproval of President Obama for his vast stash of PAC money, but I would argue that the president has no choice but to follow an established system he's trapped in to win an election that for the salvation of the country he must win.

Mr. Roemer could be a transformative president, but will probably never have the opportunity to prove it.

In the course of these events
Buddy is the only one
In this presidential run
Who makes almost perfect sense

That the people rarely hear.
Cruelly shunned by every peer,
Sadly, Buddy can't compete
On the stage where rivals meet---

There he's never seen or heard
Getting out his sober word.