"Solicitor General Elena Kagan, a born-and-bred New Yorker, may not realize it, but her selection as President Obama's nominee to the Supreme Court is a boost for her hometown, which has pretty much been awash in unwelcome news for more than a week."
Obama made a safe pick: He wanted Kagan to have an easy path to the court. And it looks like that's exactly what she'll have. No Senator will buck the tide in an election year.
"What the Court needs right now is someone who will fight for the rights of people who aren't part of the upper crust. What we need to hear is that Elena Kagan knows how to stand firm and doesn't think that compromise is the only way out of disagreement or that making the other side happy no matter how closed minded and belligerent they are is somehow admirable. We've had enough of that lately."
"little wonder with such insular backgrounds that justices of the Supreme Court should be tempted to lay down the terms of existence for 300 million Americans. "
It's Supreme Court nomination time again, which means that it will soon be nomination hearing time, which means that Elena Kagan will soon be asked how she believes the Constitution should be interpreted. But just in time comes a new book - "The Living Constitution," by David A. Strauss - that tells us not to bother about that question because, odd though it might seem, the Constitution does not play a central role in constitutional interpretation.
"The Obama administration is supporting efforts by the Saudi royal family to defeat a long-running lawsuit seeking to hold it liable for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. "
"Kagan's sexual orientation is irrelevant. The only side this line of questioning helps is the far right, who have already mounted a whisper campaign about her sexuality. "
"Political migration to the right has resulted in a weakening of individuals' rights and transferred political, economic and legislative power to multi-national corporations and the upper class."