What's the big idea? Democrats are scrambling for a new paradigm. Maybe they don't need one.

• Author: Drum, Kevin
• Position: The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics - Book review

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The Argument: Billionaires, Bloggers, and the Battle to Remake Democratic Politics by Matt Bai Penguin Press HC, 336 pp.

One of the most annoying conventions of serious book reviewing is the apparently widespread belief that it's unsophisticated to come right out and say what you think of a book. So let's get that out of the way right now: I had more fun reading The Argument than I've had reading any political book in ages. It was fun the way The Boys on the Bus was fun. The way Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 was fun. (Am I dating myself here?) Or maybe even the way Primary Colors was fun.

Which is not to say that the book is entirely fair or entirely right. But it sure is a romp if you enjoy inside baseball. Really inside baseball.

Fair warning, though: The Argument is not really about an argument at all. In fact, it's more about the lack of an argument. It's about the angst and dejection of Democratic politicians and activists who woke up after the 2004 election and discovered that their party still didn't have what it needed to win elections. At various times the book's author, Matt Bai, calls this lack a "philosophical framework," a "compelling case," or a "new paradigm," but basically it all boris down to one thing: a big new idea--something that will define the Democratic Party in the information age and earn the loyalty--and votes--of a new generation of voters who take the past triumphs of the party for granted.

Bai takes a look at this search for a big new idea through three lenses. The first is the Democracy Alliance, a secretive group of billionaires trying to fund their way to an answer. The second is MoveOn, a grassroots organization that was founded in 1998 and then took off after 9/11. The third is the blogosphere. All three groups have spent the past few years, each in its own way, groping toward ... something.

But what? If you're willing to deal in very broad brushstrokes, the three big liberal waves of the twentieth century were powered by three different big ideas. The progressive era was mostly about labor rights and good government. The New Deal was about building a social safety net. The 1960s were powered by the rights revolution. All of these big ideas are still salient in the twenty-first century--Andy Stern, president of the 1.8-million-member Service Employees International Union, is busily trying to unionize the service sector, Michael Moore is trying to convince the country to adopt national health care, and gay marriage is right up there with abortion on the cultural hot-button scale--but they...