This is a watershed year for the Republican party and most people don't get it. So I'll lay it out for you quick and plain. Mike Huckabee is not the Republican nominee for President of the United States. I think we can all take this as evidence that the Religious Right can no longer muster a majority in the Republican party. But they are still probably the Republicans' largest minority.
The majority of Republicans chose John McCain, whom the Religious Right and other Social Conservatives consider to be practically a Democrat. By himself, he would be unelectable because the majority of Republicans are not passionate enough to put up signs, make cold calls, raise money, and drive people to the polls on election day. To get elected, he would need to get the Religious Right and other Social Conservatives fired up, because they will do all those things. So he picked Sarah Palin to get the Republican "base" to work for the ticket.
Barack Obama, of course, has the Democratic party "base" fired up all by himself. The most organized part of that base consists of trade unions, who can be quite disciplined about doing what it takes to win elections.
My prediction: it will be close. And no system of voting produces satisfactory results when it's close. Half the country will be jubilant, half the country will be appalled.
And once again we'll muddle through.
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