Maybe you haven’t heard of Buddy Roemer. Or perhaps you just hadn’t noticed that the one term Louisiana governor was a GOP candidate for president in 2012.
Either position is understandable—Roemer has not been included on any of the televised debates to date. He has had, accordingly, little coverage in the media and, more importantly, has refused to accept donations above $100 (and even then funds must be from individuals only). That makes it difficult to get heard in this type of race.
“I’m 0-for-16 when it comes to nationally televised debates,” Roemer said in The Atlantic. “And I’m at a loss to know why I can’t get a fair hearing.”
“The debates are running the whole show.”
Not to be deterred Roemer, 67, has been campaigning hard in New Hampshire since announcing his bid in July last year (he ignored Iowa) and has delivered a consistent message about what he would do if elected: get the corrupting influence of big corporate money out of American politics; replace free trade with fair trade; and bring the jobs home.
“What’s the biggest problem facing America? It’s work! It’s jobs!” he told The Epoch Times several weeks before the Iowa caucuses. “It’s ‘What are my kids and grandkids are going to do in a society that makes nothing.’”
Roemer believes cheap labor and cutting corners on international regulatory standards in China are behind America’s demise, but does not blame the Chinese people for that.
“I’ve been to China many times. People are wonderful—very decent, family people, work hard,” he said, “They like America when I talked to the citizens. But it’s a one party dictator communist country that trades unfairly. And I challenge that.”
The problem he believes is also of America’s making, beginning with the notion of free trade.
“Let me say again that corporate America—in the height of the recession, never made so much money as it’s made in the last 24 months. … And they’re doing it by using cheap labor overseas and firing Americans. They have to justify it somehow and they do it with ”free trade,“ he said, adding, ”They also do it with their checkbook.”
Roemer said if elected he would eliminate deductions for foreign expenses, do away with foreign tax credit, and promote Made in America, which would include putting in place a “fair trade adjustment with products made unfairly in other countries.”
“If we do those three things, we'll have the biggest boom in this country for 70 years,” he said.
A U.S. congressman from 1981–1988, Roemer is gaining some traction in New Hampshire despite the media block out. He polled at 3 percent in a Public Policy poll taken last weekend, just two days before the New Hampshire primaries due Jan 10. That is above the well-funded Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who was polling at 1 percent, but well below the lead, Mitt Romney at 35 percent and Ron Paul at 16 percent.
But if up can mean down in the blink of an eye, as is wont to happen in this GOP race, Roemer, as dogged as any of the other candidates, is likely to snatch the crown for underdog from self-titled Jon Huntsman, who has staked a big claim in New Hampshire.
“They say this state loves an underdog. Ladies and gentlemen, here is your underdog,” Huntsman, proclaimed, referring to himself while campaigning last weekend.
A former Utah governor and U.S. ambassador to China, Huntsman is considered a moderate among today’s Republicans, fiscally conservative, and with a broad position across social issues including human rights in China. Like Roemer, he has run a low-key campaign, passing over Iowa and banking on the Granite state.
Unlike Roemer however, Huntsman has no such criteria for donations, is well funded, and has been included in televised debates. Like Rick Santorum in Iowa, he has done the hard work in New Hampshire and may experience a surge at the final polls. He is to date at 16 percent in the Public Policy poll, ahead of Newt Gingrich at 12 percent and Rick Santorum at 11 percent.
That has to leave Roemer as the undisputed underdog—even Rick Perry was able to participate in the televised debate.
True to his title, however, Roemer has not given up. Founder of his own American company, he says he is not running because he needs a job or “glory.”
“I’m running because I figured out America’s hurting and the only way to make it healthy again is to cut off the money from the politicians from special interests and confront the unfair traders. They’re connected,” he said.
It will be tough on $100 donations, he says; 1 million people for the primaries and then at least 5 million against the president, but he believes with the wonders of social media, there is a chance saying, “I think I can do it—in the age of the Internet.”
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