People keep saying how unusual this year’s presidential race is. They're wrong. It's an absolutely normal Third World election.

We have three candidates still standing: a self-righteous socialist who's learned nothing in 50 years except how to rally the economically illiterate and uninformed; an heir to wealth who's done nothing impressive in 50 years except to hone his skills as a self-promoter and demagogue; and an insider who's climbed the greasy pole alongside her husband, enriching herself and her family through 50 years of "public service." Welcome to the United States of Argentina.

What is to be done?

Resist. Resist the decline of America. Resist an Argentinian future. Resistance can mean lots of things over the next few years. But in the here and now, resistance means finding a serious and credible independent candidate.

Thus David French of National Review wrote eloquently this week urging Mitt Romney to take up the gauntlet. French points out that "at this moment, American voters face a choice between two historically corrupt, dishonest, and incompetent politicians. . . . Given the stakes of the election, to simply leave the race to Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump is to guarantee a terrible presidency marked by incompetence and cronyism." And so, "There is just hope—however slim—of avoiding this national disaster: America needs a third option."

It would be great if Romney chose to run to provide that third option. It would be great if former vice-presidential candidates Joe Lieberman or Paul Ryan, or former cabinet officials like Mitch Daniels or Condoleezza Rice, or former presidential hopefuls like Marco Rubio or Jeb Bush, or current governors like Nikki Haley or Susana Martinez chose to run. They would all start from positions of relative strength.

But even as polls show an amazing level of public receptivity to such an independent effort, even as Donald Trump makes his unfitness for office more manifest every time he speaks, even as Hillary Clinton's unfitness for office is made more obvious by a report from the Obama administration's State Department inspector general, even as all this happens . . . major public figures may choose not to run.

Yet the fact of Trump's and Clinton's unfitness for the Oval Office has become so self-evident that it's no longer clear one needs a famous figure to provide an alternative.

So the alternative to Trump and Clinton could be a not-terribly-well-known but capable congressman like Mike Pompeo or Adam Kinzinger. It could be a respected former senator like Judd Gregg or Mel Martinez. Or the leader of the resistance could turn out to be someone who hasn't yet held elective office.

Take David French, the author of the aforementioned article making the case for Romney. The fortysomething French is a best-selling author, an attorney, and a combat veteran of Iraq. A graduate of David Lipscomb College in Nashville and then of Harvard Law School, his legal practice made him one of the nation's leading defenders of free speech on campus. He is the author or coauthor of several books, including, most recently, Rise of ISIS: A Threat We Can't Ignore. In 2007, having volunteered for military service, French deployed to Iraq, serving in Diyala Province as Squadron Judge Advocate for the 2nd Squadron, 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, where he was awarded the Bronze Star. He lives with his wife and children in Columbia, Tennessee, and is a writer for National Review.

I happen to know David French. To say that he would be a better and a more responsible president than Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump is to state a truth that would become self-evident as more Americans got to know him. There are others like him. There are thousands of Americans who—despite a relative lack of fame or fortune—would be manifestly superior to our current choices. And there are many, many others who stand ready to help whoever emerges to have the basic resources, assistance, and infrastructure to mount a credible effort.

Would such an effort be extraordinary? Yes, indeed. But America is an extraordinary nation. And as our most extraordinary (and one of our most unlikely) president remarked, "I happen temporarily to occupy this big White House. I am a living witness that any one of your children may look to come here as my father's child has. It is in order that each of you may have through this free government which we have enjoyed, an open field and a fair chance for your industry, enterprise and intelligence—that you may all have equal privileges in the race of life, with all its desirable human aspirations—it is for this that the struggle should be maintained. . . . The nation is worth fighting for, to secure such an inestimable jewel."

Isn't the elevation to the White House of Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump worth resisting? Isn't such resistance the least we can do to help secure such an inestimable jewel?