Just when you thought Roy Moore had ridden off into the political sunset ....
.... he comes storming back to win his old job back as chief justice of Alabama's Supreme Court.
Yes, that Roy Moore. The same Roy Moore who rocketed to stardom as a circuit judge when he posted the Ten Commandments in his courtroom and rode that fame to statewide elected office as chief justice.
The same Roy Moore who later defied a federal court order to remove a Ten Commandments monument from the Supreme Court grounds and was prosecuted by the state's Republican attorney general and subsequently removed from office.
That guy.
The Roy Moore who then became a martyr to the evangelical right, who foolishly challenged Alabama's incumbent Republican governor and got a serious ass whipping.
The same Roy Moore who flirted with the idea of running for president.
Yes, he's back. With about 97% of the vote now counted Moore had slightly more than 50% of the vote in the Republican primary over two opponents. There is no Democrat running so Moore would be elected if he avoids a runoff. Hell, even if a Democrat were running, he'd still win.
The job only came open because Chief Justice Sue Bell Cobb, one of the last remaining Democrats in statewide elected office, abruptly quit. Chuck Malone was appointed to fill the vacancy and ran in the primary.
But Malone and the third guy in the race, Charlie Graddick, split the establishment vote.
Graddick is another piece of work. He used to be a Democrat and was once attorney general. He was famous for having once said of inmates on death row "fry 'em till their eyes pop out."
Graddick also accelerated the demise of the Alabama Democratic Party with a campaign for governor that ended up with goofball Guy Hunt becoming the state's first Republican governor in a century.
Hopefully we have seen the last of Charlie Graddick. Good riddance.
Roy Moore is another matter.
If Roy had a clue about how to organize a political campaign or how to raise serious money he'd be a force on the national Republican scene. He has rock star charisma among evangelicals.
But Roy's campaigns have been comically amateurish. Even this time he was outspent 3 to 1 by his opponents. He won because he has intense name recognition and because Rick Santorum boosted the evangelical vote.
Roy's big problem has always been that the Republican business elite in Alabama hates his guts. They look down on him and they saw to it that he was pummeled when he ran for governor.
Now he has the last laugh.
Roy Moore will no doubt set the cause of justice in Alabama back by decades. With what is now an all-Republican Supreme Court the inmates are in full control of the asylum.
But there is also something quite satisfying in seeing the state's GOP elite getting their asses handed to them.