The Hope of the Web

Bill McKibben in The New York Review of Books reviews Crashing the Gate: Netroots, Grassroots, and the Rise of People-Powered Politics by Jerome Armstrong and Markos Moulitsas Zuniga.

Their point is that the Republicans have prospered by ignoring ideological consistency. They've held together a disparate coalition that ranges from right-wing evangelists and other promoters of conservative moral values to big businesses dependent on federal subsidies and tax cuts, each of whom realize they will get more of what they want by cooperating in joint efforts. A Democratic majority in the House and Senate would protect abortion rights even if individual senators were wobbly on the issue.