I haven't been writing much about Netroots Nation because I assume if you're reading this blog you're probably already being saturated with news from elsewhere. But one of the things that struck me, having gone to CPAC for the first time this year, is that there's really no comparison in terms of the acceptability of fringe groups. At CPAC, groups like the John Birch Society and the white supremacist endorsed Youth for Western Civilization had booths, and even though folks like Pam Geller were "banned," they nevertheless drew a substantial crowd by having an event in the same hotel accusing the so-called Ground Zero Mosque planners of being "the second wave of the 9/11 attacks." At Netroots, you're going to see a lot of unions and environmental groups with booths, but it's not like the Communist Party USA is going to be there handing out brochures. Meanwhile to get banned from CPAC for your actual beliefs you have to do something really terrible and radical like oppose a ban on allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly in the U.S. military. There's just a real asymmetry in terms of how welcoming the left and right are to their cranks.
