It has been said that the Bush administration is trying to move up their appointment to replace Sandra Day O'Connor to remove Karl Rove from the headlines. (Perhaps they are leaning on Rehnquist to delay any retirement until it might be needed for a similar smokescreen?)
Assuming that a Bush nominee will almost certainly get through unless highly controversial (and even if so, probably stands a good chance of confirmation anyways) and that Bush avoids the motr egregious potential nominees....
...should the Democrats allow a relatively quiet confirmation process? Unless the nominee allows us to press the meta-narrative that Bush is in the back pocket of intolerant religious radicals, should we instead try to stay on message that the Rove-Plame mess is part of the other major political meta-narrative, that George W. Bush is the spiritual heir of Richard Nixon, without even a whiff of partially mitigating competence?