One casualty of the serial crises confounding American politics of late is President Obama's charisma, heretofore seemingly one of his greatest assets. As Politico pointedly asked, "Obama's charisma: Where did he leave it?"� Pundits and commentators have even raised the question of whether he might after all be "just another politician."�

Jon Runyan is no-nonsense. Just what you would expect of a former NFL offensive lineman. When he was signed by the Philadelphia Eagles in 2000, he didn't take up the celebrity life. He bought a 23-acre farm in nearby Mount Laurel, New Jersey. When a Philadelphia Inquirer reporter came calling and asked him what he planned to do with the cows on his land, Runyan replied: "I'm going to raise them as beef cows and...