Will she be confirmed? Should she be?

http://news.google.com/news/more?pz=1&c ... tM&topic=h

My first reaction was that she isn't the real candidate that he really wants. He knows that the first one will immediately be eviscerated by the confirmation panel, so he purposely chose a weak candidate.

The interesting one will be the supposedly "better" second(real choice) choice.

Baring something totally unforeseen, she will definitely be confirmed.

No, but that's completely irrelevant. It's like asking if you should be wearing your seatbelt 2 seconds before you hit a brick wall. Yes, you should be wearing your seatbelt, but it's far too late to be discovering such a thing.

It simply doesn't matter, in the long-term, if she's confirmed or not. In the short-term, I certainly hope it can be stopped, but based on its lack of relevance, I'll feel very little either way.

In His Grip,

christian_concern@yahoo.com

I hope so. Probably.

It's hard to tell what a nominee will do once on the court. She seems to be a highly intelligent, well-qualified person--with the extra plus of being able to get along with people and create consensus. I'm looking forward to learning more about her. I don't see any reason for Gom's quick and unsupported rejection. Why doesn't it matter, Gom, in the long term? Why do you object to the nomination? Who would you prefer?

(Compared with Thomas, for example, she's obviously terrific!)

Why, Plekto, do you think she is not Obama's first choice? What's wrong with her, other than the fact that she has not been a judge before?

I think there's nothing really wrong with her, but I think he chose a 2nd tier person for the job because in the past most every first candidate to the job has been besieged by the press and Congress. I'd certainly not put my last, best candidate forward first. And if she does get in, well, he still has his"A list" person in the wings to replace one of the others. I seriously doubt that there won't be at least 3 or 4 replacements if he stays around for a second term. Most of the court is seriously old.

I found this online
"As of May 11, 2010, the average age of the justices is 68 years, 10 months."

Stevens for sure isn't going to last another 8 years, since he's 90. Maybe he will, he IS stubborn, after all.

I heard an argument that now is the time for him to pick a more liberal justice given the likelihood that the democratic congressional majority will be smaller after 2010. I think this makes sense: I bet we'll see another retiring justice later in Obama's presidency, and that's when I bet he'll pick someone that's more centrist than Kagan.

I do not think it makes sense for him to offer anybody as a sacrificial lamb to congress, the media or anyone else. My bet is that he's fully behind Kagan, and that she will be confirmed.

I haven't had time to verify this myself, but the "conventional wisdom" is that the Bork and Roberts nominations effectively wrote the playbook on the process. This may be what Kagan was referring to in her article that the press is jumping all over.

Oh, I'm sure Obama will be pleased if she gets in. But he's not showing all of his cards, either.

First choice Sotomayor made it easily.

Why shouldn't she be? If you're in the Senate what reason would you have not to confirm her?