The Internet Giveth And The Internet Taketh Away

Fabrizio Costantini for The New York Times

I trust the boys and girls over at Daily Kos and the other "Netroots" sites are paying some attention to today's NY Times. According to the Times, an explosion of resentment about that part of the grand immigration deal that opponents call "amnesty" for the undocumented already in the country was fired up by the internet and talk radio. The result was a deluge of calls, emails and letters to Senators that scared the be'jesus out of many Republicans.

The truth is that the medium is irrelevant to a large extent. Yes, it is now very easy to email a long list of people at one keystroke, but their rate of response is still determined by the oldest political motivator in the book, anger.

The Kosacks have mistaken their recent successes (we won't bring up the Lamont failure) to some quality of truth in their views. In fact, they failed to note the widespread atmosphere of fury throughout the society directed at Bush. They have just been picking the low hanging fruit of that fury.

The immigration deal provided some fuel that fired up the right. They may appear older and less hip, but they can still get just as angry. Maybe more so. Doesn't the word crotchety sort of belong to those of a certain age?