As discussed here and here, the Republican Party consists of three wings.

First, there’s the Money! wing, whose guiding principal is: “Money. More.” Then the Bombs! wing, whose guiding principal is, “Grrrr! Rrrowf! Rrrowf!.” And finally the Jesus! wing which believes God made gays on the seventh day at a wild post-creation party. (During which God did several things even He can’t remember. And woe unto he who remindeth Him.)

We are down to three Republican candidates, and each is not only a representative of one wing of the party, but the mathematically precise representative of that wing. Each of the three is the perfect embodiment, the distilled essence, of his wing of the GOP. Quite frankly, it’s eerie.

Mitt (the flip) Romney isn’t just a water-carrier for the Money! wing, he’s a nine-figure guy himself. Rich? Oh, yeah. And his main claim to fame? That he’s rich. Major accomplishment? Richness. Campaign platform? “Hey, I’m rich. Let a rich guy run things.”

But Mitt goes beyond mere richness, to embody the spirit of every money-lover who ever said, “I will say whatever it takes, do whatever it takes to get what I want.” In other words, he’s not just rich, he’s utterly ruthless and, as far as anyone can tell, devoid of moral center.

Now that, my friends, is the zero-impurities, 200 proof, essence of the Money! wing.

As for Bombs! Republicans, no fiction writer would dare to invent a character so perfectly suited for the role as John McCain. The man doesn’t just support Bombs! He actually dropped them.

He’s a naval aviator. A solid gold, honest-to-God hero. A man among men. The concepts of honor, duty, country aren’t something he puts on, the way Mitt Romney dresses up in his pro-life camouflage, these are things that go all the way down to John McCain’s DNA. You look at a John McCain chromosome under the electron microscope and you know what you see? John Wayne in a cowboy hat.

McCain was trashing Don Rumsfeld when no one (well, except me) was trashing him. McCain was surging when Bush was still staying the course. And when it comes to fitting the role to emotional perfection, what could be better than McCain’s cranky, teeth-gritting, I’d-punch-you-in-the-face-if-my-arms-hadn’t-been-broken-during-my-five-years-of-torture-you-punk, take no bull, never back down personality? McCain is Bombs!

Finally, what overly-literal casting director would have sent Mike Huckabee to be the candidate of the Jesus! wing? The Governor-Pastor doesn’t just believe in God, and the major highlights of the Bible. He believes the craziest stuff in the Bible. He believes the stuff that makes six year-old Sunday school kids go, “Nah.”

He believes Mary was a virgin, Lazarus was dead, and the Jews couldn’t find their way out of Gaza for forty years. He believes a fish swallowed Jonah and Joshua fit’ the battle of Jericho, Jericho, Jericho, and the walls came a tumblin’ down. The man believes that a nice Tyrannosaurus couple climbed onto Noah’s ark, took a cruise, and then disembarked carrying their souvenir photographs and a handbag they picked up in Cancun.

And could he be any more perfect, with his quick wit and his ready smile and his goofy plans? He’s the perfect door-to-door, Bible-salesman huckster, right down to his ya-gotta-be-kidding-me name.

Most election years you get a candidate who represents Money! and one for Bombs! and one for Jesus! And in the end, the GOP weights their selection, with Money! naturally carrying the most weight, while Jesus! gets lip service and one chance to embarrass the country before all of western civilization. But this year there is no compromise. No synthesis. No candidate who represents anything other than his own wing.

The only uniting factor this year is that Bombs! and Jesus! really, really despise Money!
Bombs! and Jesus! united in a burning hatred of Money! Wow. I don’t know who wrote this script, but I have to say, as a Democrat, I’m liking it.