A little insider info on Alito and Roberts...

Ran into a friend of mine who recently graduated tip-top of her class from an Ivy-League law school. Currently, she's interviewing with Supreme Court Justices for whom she hopes to clerk. During this 'courtship' process (pun intended) she's been privvy to some within the beltway (and within the offices of the SCJ's) perceptions of Roberts and Alito. Here's the low-down:

Roberts is an OK-guy. Not a radical conservative.

Alito, on the other hand, should be feared and filibustered. He is "100 times worse than Scalia and Thomas and won't rest until Roe v. Wade is overturned".

My friend is a moderate Democrat and not prone to hyperbole.

Maybe it's a good idea to call Frist's bluff re: the nuclear option.

I know it's out there, and anyone inside knows...especially the clerks and pages. Unfortunately, I don't know any.

I'm hoping to rekindle our once good friendship. If so, I'll keep DU up-to-date.

if we can't filibuster a supreme court nominee, then we're political dogmeat.
i mean, really. miers went down because THEY thought she wasn't conservative enough!
if we roll over on scalito, then there's no stopping them on anything.

not that we do a whole heck of a lot of stopping them as it is, but really, if we can't flex our muscles against a president with such abysmal approval numbers, there's hardly a point in showing up for the roll calls in the first place.