For those of you who are interested in Andrew Sullivan's brand of "conservatism," National Review's Jonah Goldberg reviews Sullivan's latest book.

*UPDATE* Sullivan has responded here. There's one response that Sullivan makes to Goldberg's review that I'd like to highlight. Sullivan quotes page 120 of his book:

To equate the astonishing rise of evangelical and Catholic fundamentalism in the contemporary West with these monstrous [theocratic] regimes would be absurd. There are a few fringe groups in America - the Christian Reconstructionists, for example - who would like to replace the United States constitution with a Biblical law, a Christian version of Sharia. But they are marginal, extremist and largely disowned by the fundamentalist mainstream. Evangelical and Catholic fundamentalists have largely engaged in America in completely legitimate and democratic activity: voting, organizing, campaigning, broadcasting, persuading. Even where they disagree with the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Constitution, they do not question that Constitution's legitimacy (although a few have indeed walked up to the brink of declaring the United States an illegitimate "regime" because of the Court's rulings). They constantly use religious language to defend their political positions - but so did Martin Luther King Jr and Abraham Lincoln. The political methods of the new fundamentalists are overwhelmingly democratic ones.

I find it interesting that Sullivan writes this -- and not just because it's sensible. Sullivan's correct that there are a few fringe Christians out there that believe in turning the U.S. into an Iran-style theocracy. The number, however, is incredibly small -- nationwide there are probably fewer of these types than you can find radical Islamists in one Dearborn, Mich., mosque. These people will never have any substantial political power -- they are far too few.

Sullivan complains that Goldberg muddles his characterization of "Christianists" to deter Christian conservatives from reading Sullivan's book. Bolshevik storytelling -- Sullivan has accomplished that feat just fine on his own. While that is what Sullivan wrote in his book, he's much less careful and measured when he writes on his blog and when he appeared on Hugh Hewitt's show. The impression that Sullivan gives is that there is no difference between the fundamentalist Christians or Evangelicals who are politically active and his "Christianists" who want Biblical law to take the place of English Common law as the basis for our legal system.