The Dish

Greenwald bows to political reality:

As I said from the beginning, the real opportunity to derail her nomination was before it was made, because the vast majority of progressives and Democrats will get behind anyone, no matter who it is, chosen by Obama.  That's just how things work.  They'll ignore most of the substantive concerns that have been raised about her, cling to appeals to authority, seize on personal testimonials from her Good Progressive friends, and try to cobble together blurry little snippets to assure themselves that she's a fine pick.  In reality, no matter what they know about her (and, more to the point, don't know), they'll support her because she's now Obama's choice, which means, by definition, that she's a good addition to the Supreme Court.  Our politics is nothing if not tribal, and the duty of Every Good Democrat is now to favor Kagan's confirmation. 

Ezra Klein:

Nominating Kagan for the court is a bit like Joe Biden naming his former chief of staff, Ted Kaufman, to replace him in the Senate. The choice is based on private knowledge rather than public knowledge, but it's not based on an absence of knowledge.

Jeffrey Toobin dissects the Kagan's position on DADT:

What is striking…is that the controversy probably tells us little about what kind of Justice she will be. Politicians (and deans) finesse issues all the time, and good ones (like Obama and Kagan) offend as few people as possible in the process. Judges, on the other hand, decide. Finessing is usually not an option. It’s a good and healthy thing that Obama decided to end the monopoly of former judges on the Supreme Court. But the experience of judging—the agony of making that up or down decision—is unique, and it will be something new for Kagan. The gays-in-the-military controversy illustrates just how different her old jobs are from her likely new one.

Adam Serwer looks over Kagan's record on executive power:

As Tom Goldstein has noted, when Kagan asserted the executive's authority to detain al-Qaeda members without trial under the laws of war, she was stating what her prospective boss had stated earlier. Even prominent Bush critic Dawn Johnsen came to the same conclusion when asked a similar question during her hearing. Kagan signing onto this criticism of the Graham amendment suggests far more skepticism of executive power in the realm of foreign policy than I initially assumed — it puts her, in 2005 and prior to Hamdan, on the same side of the detainee question as the lawyers at the Justice Department who were smeared by Liz Cheney and Bill Kristol.

That said, Kagan's record is mostly blank. This letter is not a record. To borrow Goldstein's metaphor, this is a thin reed to hang an assessment of how a Justice Kagan might rule on such issues in the future. The fact that Kagan avoided commenting on many of the most controversial issues of her day makes her a gamble, although I suppose it means something that — given her relative silence — she chose to comment on this one. At the same time, one assumes that if these kinds of issues really did matter, she would have spoken up far more than she did.

And William Jacobson highlights Kagan's view of same-sex marriage – that there is no constitutional right to marriage equality:

This doesn't mean that Kagan opposes gay marriage. But she clearly believes it is a matter for the political process, not a constitutional right.

While it is not clear what view the other Justices have, it is likely that a Kagan on the Court will put an end to any ultimate chance of success in the federal lawsuit lawsuit filed by David Boies and Ted Olson to have California Prop. 8 declared unconstitutional.

Reasonably assuming the four conservative judges share Kagan's view, there now will be a definite majority on the Court against recognizing a constitutional right to gay marriage.

"We should give more consideration to the quality of homosexual relationships. A stable relationship is certainly better than if someone chooses to be promiscuous," – Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, head of the Austrian Church and close friend of the Pope.

The same pup has shown up at nearly every demonstration and riot in Athens over the past few years. Plenty of action shots here.

(The dog stood guard over a line of protesters in December when students took to the streets to protest against a plan for policing at universities. Photo by Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images.)

Goldblog discovers a new source of Jew-hatred: the English. Now the resilience of English anti-Semitism is a fact; it is also a fact that in recent years, especially on the left, explicit loathing of Israel has become disgustingly common. But open discussion of the real crisis in Israel and its impact on a global war that increasingly affects the entire West is not anti-Semitism, especially when it is conducted as a way to promote a way for Israel to survive with its values and Jewish identity intact. And the attempt to chill such discourse can surely be the effect of sentences like this one:

Much of "Trials of the Diaspora" describes the deep tradition of English literary anti-Semitism, from Shylock to Fagin to Caryl Churchill, in a summary that leaves you wondering if it is possible for a properly-educated Englishman to avoid harboring certain stereotypical views of Jews, stereotypes and assumptions that manifest themselves in disproportionate hostility whenever Jews behave in ways the English find at all disagreeable.

According to Jim Pickard, the Tories are "prepared to whip a referendum on the alternative vote through the House of Commons" but Labour has agreed to immediate action on the alternative vote plus additional electoral reforms. Iain Dale warns:

I am just hearing that the Conservatives have offered the LibDems a referendum on AV. This is exactly what Brown has already offered. The LibDems must surely realise that that's as much as they are going to get, especially as there is not a majority in the Commons for anything more. Listen to Tom Harris on this. He talks sense.

There are two good things which could emerge from a Lib-Lab coalition. One would be almost guaranteed Tory landslide at the next election, which would surely not be long in coming. And a second would be the virtual decimation of the Liberal Democrats as an electoral force.

Time to make your minds up my LibDem friends.

George Eaton makes the case:

As UK Polling Report's Anthony Wells notes, the Lib Dems are now in second place in 242 seats, up from 188 at the last election. And the party is now within 10 per cent of the winning party in 45 seats, up from 31 in 2005. By contrast, Labour is now in third place in 232 constituencies, up from 151 at the last election. There are large parts of the country, most notably Scotland and inner city London, where the Tories were pushed into third place in 1997 and have struggled to win ever since. Some in Labour must now fear that they face the same fate.

Clegg as PM? Maybe Cleggmania has yet to run its full course.

Right Wing Watch rounds up reaction from the rump. Tom Minnery of Focus on the Family clarifies the stance of social conservatives:

Kagan's nomination is a triumph for liberal ideology and judicial activism. She has never been a judge, nor written a judicial opinion. In fact, she has very limited experience in the actual practice of law. Her resume reveals her to be an academic who has served liberal judges, liberal presidents, and liberal universities. Her entire career has been lived in a narrow slice of the judicial spectrum. Even with her sparse legal record, one thing stands out—her emotional and legal commitment to the LGBT agenda.

American Family Association and Americans For Truth are a tad more direct:

It's time we got over the myth that what a public servant does in his private life is of no consequence. We cannot afford to have another sexually abnormal individual in a position of important civic responsibility, especially when that individual could become one of nine votes in an out of control oligarchy that constantly usurps constitutional prerogatives to unethically and illegally legislate for 300 million Americans.

The stakes are too high. Social conservatives must rise up as one and say no lesbian is qualified to sit on the Supreme Court. Will they?

The days are past when this could be brushed under the rug. Let's have an honest debate, can we? The way to counter prejudice is through truth – not avoidance. For the right to oppose Kagan merely because she is gay – if she is – would be one more step toward their self-destruction. By staying mum, the Obamites may be playing yet another rope-a-dope. I just cannot see how in 2010, ambiguity is an option. I mean: who would claim that John Roberts' heterosexuality is somehow private? It is a demonstrably reported fact that there would now be no Protestants on the court – just Catholics and Jews. Why is this not an invasion of privacy, if asking someone about their sexual orientation is?

Massie's first thoughts:

The problem with a Lib-Lab coalition of course is that it won't have a majority. One can see how it could limp along but one cannot but think that while a single-party could soldier on as a majority matters would be much more problematic for a coalition minority. Nor does including the tiny parties strengthen matters much.

And so, playing Salome, Clegg has got Gordon's head on a platter and we now have the extraordinary sight of the Lib Dems negotiating with both parties at the same time. This is madness and invites the public to view the Lib Dems as a party of political hoors prepared to sell their services to the highest-bidder for nothing more than self-evidently narrow, selfish interests.

Alex Barker:

A lesson in never underestimating Brown. His timing could have been no better in placing maximum pressure on the Tories. This will test Cameron’s nerve like nothing else. Is he willing to make the ultimate sacrifice on electoral reform to take power? Will the MPs buckle at the 6.30pm meeting? Is power worth 25 Tory seats at the next election (which is the price of AV)?

(Photo: David Cameron this morning, by Ben Stansall.)

Bagehot writes that "this is bold and desperate act by Mr Brown—a kind of political kamikaze, immolating himself in a bid to prevent David Cameron becoming prime minister":

The beneficiary, perhaps, will be Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats. After a long meeting with his MPs this afternoon, Mr Clegg's negotiator, David Laws, emerged to say that his party was seeking more details from the Tories over various aspects of policy (see my last post). Mr Brown's statement has provided Mr Clegg with some extremely useful leverage in his negotiations with Mr Cameron. The Tories have hitherto been confident that Mr Clegg had no viable alternative to dealing with them. Perhaps he still doesn't; but Mr Brown's act of self-sacrifice will leave them feeling much less sanguine.

James Forsyth, on the other hand, thinks this helps the Tories.