apocalypse when?

Slate's Jeffrey Rosen, reviewing Mark Tushnet's A Court Divided, points out the obvious:

Tushnet's accessible and astute book reminds us—at the moment when we need to be reminded—that the Supreme Court rarely transforms the national political debate. Most of the time, it influences national politics only at the margins—striking down obscure laws that have lost their national constituency (such as sodomy laws) or tacking gently left or right in response to shifts in the national mood. Occasionally, the court tries to impose a vision that is intensely contested by national majorities (as it did during the 1930s), and in these rare cases it tends to provoke a political backlash, followed by a judicial retreat. Most important of all, Tushnet offers a useful caution to his fellow liberals: Rather than squandering their energies on ineffective opposition to Supreme Court nominations, they should focus instead on retaking the White House and Congress.