It was no surprise that the first day of questions for Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan defaulted to a very familiar script, where a nominee only gives Senators limited answers about his or her legal views.
Senators reminded Kagan repeatedly of her 1995 article, where she complained that Supreme Court nominees were making a charade out of the process by not speaking their mind on legal questions.
But predictably, when the time came for Kagan to follow through on her 1995 arguments, she indicated that it probably would not be a good idea for her to say too much about her thoughts on a variety of subjects.
"My, oh my, oh my," said Sen. Herb Kohl (D-WI), who hit Kagan with a series of questions from her 1995 article, like what direction she would move the Supreme Court, or what she thought of the current crop of Justices.
Everyone in the room knew that was going to happen, no matter her "vapid and hollow" comment about the confirmation hearings that she watched up close with Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
"You do get the Arthur Murray award, much to my chagrin," said Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK).
"Maybe you should be on Dancing With the Stars," Coburn added.
While Republicans tried to press Kagan on a dispute between the Pentagon and Harvard Law School over access to military recruiters while Kagan was the Dean, it didn't seem to take hold in the Committee room, as Republicans instead focused many of their questions on this week's Second Amendment ruling by the High Court.
Kagan said she thought the Heller decision of two years ago that overturned a handgun ban in the District of Columbia was "settled law," and she also had nothing disparaging to say about this week's decision in McDonald vs City of Chicago.
"I have absolutely no reason to think that the Court's analysis was incorrect in any way," Kagan said, adding that she expects a full roster of cases in coming years to explore what type of gun restrictions still pass muster.
"The Court will consider, sort of regulation by regulation, which meets its standard," she said, not getting into the details of what might be constitutional and what was not.
As usual, Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) provided some interesting moments in his questioning, getting Kagan to promise that she would write a letter of support if Miguel Estrada is ever nominated again for a judgeship.
Estrada was picked by President George W. Bush for the Circuit Court of Appeals, but his nomination was blocked by Democrats. Even so, Estrada penned a letter of public support for Kagan - they were law school classmates.
Graham also pulled one basic quote out of Kagan, about her past.
"In terms of my political views, I have been a Democrat all my life," Kagan said.
That was no surprise to anyone in the room either, as the two of them agreed that elections do have consequences when it comes to who gets to pick a Supreme Court nominees
It was no surprise that the first day of questions for Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan defaulted to a very familiar script, where a nominee only gives Senators limited answers about his or her legal views. Senators reminded Kagan repeatedly of her 1995 article, where she complained that Supreme Court ...
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