SCOTUS Fever

There's a whopper case of it going around.  And there's only one prescription...

No, not more cowbell.  The only cure for this one is a knock-down, drag-out, horrendously protracted battle on Capitol Hill.  The one we've all been waiting for.

The vacancy created by Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's retirement is sure to make recent Senate scuffles seem almost civil in comparison.  Prepare for the return of the Gang of 14.  Brace yourself for tirades about radical ideologies.  Ready your sensibilities for long-winded lectures from Teddy the Bork Slayer, John "Nuance" Kerry, and crowd favorite Dr. Demento Dean.  In fact, despite his normally reserved disposition, the mouth of the DNC has already cloyed the President with a simpering plea to deliver a candidate that fetches "consensus rather than confrontation".

The fact that the moderate O'Connor will retire before the more conservative Rehnquist, who was expected to yield Bush's first nom op, changes the playing field slightly.  Since O'Connor was frequently a "swing" justice, siding with the majority in a slew of key 5-4 decisions, a strongly conservative pick would shift the overall tenor of the bench more so than it would were it replacing the chief justice.

Bush has stated he won't announce a pick before he gets back from the G8 summit next week, but a short list of candidates has apparently been circulated in the White House.  So let's make with the speculating:

Who do you think Bush will nominate?

	Samuel Alito, Jr. (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Janice Rogers Brown (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Edith Brown Clement (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Miguel Estrada (Lawyer)
	Emilio Garza (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Alberto Gonzales (Attorney General)
	Edith Hollan Jones (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Michael Luttig (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Michael McConnell (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Theodore Olson (Solicitor General)
	John Roberts (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Larry Thompson (Former Deputy Attorney General)
	James Harvie Wilkinson III (Courts of Appeals Judge)
	Other (Whatever)
Free polls from Pollhost.com

To bone up on the candidates, see Slate, the Chicago Sun Times, and the SCOTUS Nomination Blog.