NEWS FROM THE FUTURE
SEPTEMBER 3, 2012
TAMPA - Former governor and Florida's Favorite Son, Jeb Bush, looking a bit bleary after 72 hours of behind-closed-doors political warfare, stepped up to the podium to welcome the exhausted applause of a weary and wary convention crowd.
"My fellow Americans," Bush announced, "It is my great pleasure to accept your nomination as the Republican candidate for President of the United States."
Former candidates Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich watched, crest-fallen, from their respective hotel suites as Bush declared victory without ever being a formal candidate himself.
"This is what democracy is all about!" said Bush, "The will of the people!"
Bush neglected to mention that, in the end, Republican grassroots Evangelicals just could not have a Come-to-Jesus moment with a Mormon as their nominee, much or less a Catholic like Newt (a convert!) Gingrich.
The newly-named "WASP Network" of Republican fat-cats held their collective breaths from the opening of the convention until the final decision nearly a week later, three days later than planned. Little did the public or the press anticipate that the first vote of the convention would fall to pieces as religious wars broke out between the competing factions. Carefully mining centuries of old hatreds between the competing Christian sects, the WASPs won in the end by putting their candidate, Jeb Bush, up as the ultimate compromise and the most likely of all to defeat the incumbent President Barack Obama.
Mitt Romney, having spent nearly his entire fortune of $200 million, shrugged, shuffled and smiled at the floor during his press conference. "Golly gee, God told me it wasn't my turn and that I should go out and do it all over again just to show Him how much I really wanted it," Romney concluded. "We'll be back next time," Romney offered, "Whenever that is..."
Gingrich rolled into a fetal position while responding to journalists' questions, mumbling back unintelligible responses punctuated by the names "Calista" and "Sheldon." In a particularly ferocious rambling, he spit up on himself and began wailing in a high-pitched scream.
The leaders of the assembled Super Pacs took turns kicking Ginrich while he was down and rubbing salt in his resulting wounds. Karl Rove doused him in lighter fluid and left the room while flipping a flaming Zippo in the former Speaker's direction. The press corps roared and then hastily evacuated the room.
Former President George H.W. Bush brushed off the press with a patrician wave of his hand, saying, "It doesn't get any better than this."
Former President George W. Bush had to be pulled by medics from his hotel chair, clutching its arms in an iron grip while twitching and muttering repeatedly, "Daddy, you said I was your favorite!"
When pressed for comment, Presidential Republican nominee Jeb Bush insisted it was his turn and he wasn't going back in the closet for another four years. "So there," was how the 6'3", 240 lb. candidate explained his position on his sudden and silent rush to the top of the ticket.
The Obama campaign responded to the nomination by immediately printing 10 million bumper-stickers saying, "Bush for President? WTF?"