Unless we've got something allot more powerful in the research about the personal life of this nominee, we have already been introduced to the newest member of the US Supreme Court. Let's look at the math.
His jucial record (with which I have very serious differences with given the great analysis of the
Alliance for Justice) will be hard to present as threatening as it truly is.
The process seems to have a potential course given what we know. The republican fog machine which has not started to confuse the discussion yet, will feed the media their talking points for constant repetition. The democratic senators on the judiciary committee will probably not coordinate their interrogation and are, no doubt, already writing their 15 minute long questions for posterity to put all Americans to sleep. The rest of the Democrats will spend countless hours complicating the discussion in making sure they are totally accurate and cover every contingency.
The Republicans have 55 Senate votes of which maybe 4 consistently vote "moderate" on women's reproductive rights (Snow, Specter, Chafee and Collins). We would need 5 votes secured to allow a filibuster to stand because the republicans with only 51 votes can change the senate rules to eliminate the filibuster for Court nominees.The "nuclear option" would not be pretty but would get the republicans unified at a time of great weakness and would allow Alito to be confirmed. They would achieve three years of unimpeded conservative nominees to the federal courts at the same time.
The so called "Gang of 14" that brokered the compromise on April 13th, 2005 on Bushes Judicial nominees offer no hope that they will come together to help derail this nomination. Arlen Specter (although not a member of this group but a consistent pro-choice vote) has already all but approved the nominee and Lindsey Graham (Mr. Alito: "one of the most distinguished individuals to ever be nominated to the Supreme Court,") is not far behind. I just don't see how the numbers work in our favor. Take a look at the list of possible votes for our side. I am very worried about the results that are possible.
THE GROUP OF 14
Democrats
Robert Byrd (West Virginia)
Daniel Inouye (Hawaii)
Mary Landrieu (Louisiana)
Joseph Lieberman (Connecticut)
Ben Nelson (Nebraska)
Mark Pryor (Arkansas)
Ken Salazar (Colorado)
Republicans
Lincoln Chafee (Rhode Island)
Susan Collins (Maine)
Mike DeWine (Ohio)
Lindsey Graham (South Carolina)
John McCain (Arizona)
John Warner (Virginia)
Olympia Snowe (Maine)