Kagan 2, Senate Rethugs 0

With two days of hearings on the nomination of Elena Kagan to be a Supreme Court justice over, we're struck with the grasping of the Rethuglican Senators who are trying to dirty her up. Throwing bogus "facts" at her about the Harvard ROTC issue, alleging that she's "anti-military," and attacking her work with former Justice Thurgood Marshall (and by extension Marshall himself) to prove she's a "liberal activist" are all that the Rethugs apparently have, with Kagan's ultimate confirmation almost assured. And they're bumbling and stumbling on the way, trying to get the best of Kagan, who is smarter than the Rethug committee members combined.

We wonder how this hearing plays out among moderate, suburban voters, who are watching one ivory-white, drawling, cornpone Rethug Senator after another attempt to bring Kagan down. It's one more indicator of how the Rethugs have become mostly a regional party, dominated by reactionary Southerners, much as the Dems were in the 40's and 50's with the "Dixecrats."