She's quite a blank slate.  That may have seemed like a dream scenario at the White House when they started down this path, but I suspect it will be rather a nightmare for them ultimately.

I would also note that "best and brightest" and "elite" are not synonyms.  There are lots of members of the elite who are not the best and brightest.  Indeed, in recent years it seems there is absolutely no accountability among our elite, you're in just by being a member of the club and once in, it doesn't really matter how smart or talented you are.

Again, maybe Kagan is brilliant.  Then again, maybe not.  I don't know.  But Americans too often shy away from a meaningful discussion of class* and it's almost always to the detriment of the 98% of us who are not in the elite.

Iirc, another Repub First Lady, Betty Ford, let it be known that she had different views from her hubby on abortion and women in the workforce, and did so while Jerry was holding down the top office, though she didn't exactly go Martha Mitchell on Jer.  

So, she "cant stand" Babs; is possibly (very quietly) pro-choice; sold pot once and stands by her Texacuting, treasury looting, knowledge loathing, fundamentalism pimping, wmd shilling man -- out of all the tens of millions of men in this country -- just like Tammy Wynette.

What is it about mousy female masochism that STILL warms people's hearts so much in this country?

The state Department of Natural Resources wants hikers, anglers and hunters to be on the lookout for giant marijuana grows on public lands.

I ask only because you have made such a definite assertion about where Kagan's interests will lie, with not a whole lot of information in hand about what her views actually are, so I figure the only way you could assert this about her is if you're psychic.

It might be helpful to understand that there really is a difference between going to an "elite" school - such as Harvard or Yale or Princeton - and being an "elitist."  

Out Of Focus
The Internet is attacking me for my essay on 'Promises, Promises.' But can we steer the debate back to where it belongs?

..... the New York Times theater review included these lines: "his emotions often seem pale to the point of colorlessness ... his relationship with [his costar Kristin] Chenoweth feels more like that of a younger brother than a would-be lover and protector." This, to me, is code: it's a way to say that Hayes's sexual orientation is getting in the way of his acting without saying the word gay.

Instead of hiding behind double entendre and leaving the obvious unstated, I wrote an essay in the May 10 issue of NEWSWEEK called "Straight Jacket" examining why, as a society, it's often hard for us to accept an openly gay actor playing a straight character. You can disagree with me if you like, but when was the last time you saw a movie starring a gay actor? The point of my essay was not to disparage my own community, but to examine an issue that is being swept under the rug.

link

more to the point Ramin Setoodeh's words can be used to describe his own writing about this subject:

He comes off as wooden and insincere, like he's trying to hide something, which of course he is.

Analysts who put the cost of the Deepwater Horizon spill at anywhere from $2-$8 billion also cautioned that the numbers could change quickly. "Those estimates can either skyrocket or come down depending on when the flow of oil is stopped,"...

BP earned $17 billion in net income last year and is projected to earn $23 billion in 2010..."BP certainly is more than capable of covering all of the expenses that they'll be liable for," Molchanov said...

"This is shaping up to be worse than the Exxon Valdez accident" in terms of oil spilled and cost for damages, said Fadel Gheit, an Oppenheimer & Co LLC managing director and senior analyst in the oil and gas sector. Exxon paid more than $3.8 billion in cleanup and damage costs, plus about $500 million in punitive damages.

It's about the enduring sense on this side of the Atlantic that America, even in the Obama era, remains a land of philistine, puritanical barbarity.

Oh, and the lack of legal scholarship that he mocks, does not appear to have to apply to Mr O'Hehir:

With the 76-year-old Oscar-winning director and convicted sex offender...

Convicted? Well yes in the minds of the american public.

Espinoza appeared to agree, saying of the 42 days Polanski spent in the state prison in Chino, "It's clear to me that was the intended sentence."
But, he added, since the director skipped town on the eve of the hearing, sentencing was never formally imposed and the case remained open.

TL

State law does not require a teacher employed by an open-enrollment charter school to be certified unless the teacher is assigned to teach special education or bilingual education, in which case the appropriate state certification is required. The  qualification under state law for a teacher at an open-enrollment charter school, other than a special education or bilingual education teacher, is a high school diploma.

We have destroyed public education in my city, one of the first with charter schools, voucher schools, and such stuff now pushed nationally by the DoE -- and by Obama (and the Ayers Foundation).  And we here now have the studies to assess the longterm impact in charter schools, voucher schools, etc., as well as public schools.