What if...?

My mother and I regularly discuss politics, especially the current candidates for president. She has gone from being a lifelong Republican solidly in the Obama camp to waffling back and forth between Obama and McCain and, finally, to deciding that she is going to write my name in on the ballot. I've been writing in Pat Paulsen for the past four elections since I'm not happy with the usual suspects pretending to the throne. This year I may write in my name, too.

That brings me to the thought that has been running around in my brain for the past few days. I mentioned my mother writing in my name on the ballot in a comment on someone else's blog and someone read it and said he'd vote for me, too. What if a real grassroots candidate with no ties to big business, the rich and famous (or infamous), lobbies, oil or arms dealers would run for president? Is it possible to use the power of the people and the vast resources of the Internet to get the word out between now and election day to create a campaign for a write-in candidate that would make enough of a showing to show the Powers That Be that they are on the wrong track and the change we want to see isn't about beautiful and moving rhetoric or religious posturing or being a millionaire but about someone who is of the people, by the people and for the people? Can we move the vast resources at our fingertips to put a real person not beholden to anyone's money or special interests in the White House?

Can it be done?