The next Supreme Court nomination.

The NYT reports on the gathering fight over the next Supreme Court nomination:

"This will be a repeat, and all the organizations that were engaged in work around the election, from big groups to small groups, will feel that this is their own personal fight," said Nan Aron, the president of the Alliance for Justice, a liberal advocacy group.

Ms. Aron said her office had been flooded with calls from students, lawyers and activists "who were involved in get-out-the-vote work and now want to turn their attention to the Supreme Court."

The energy for the get-out-the-vote effort re-channels itself.

Here's a quote from Senator Shumer:

"If a candidate is a mainstream candidate, even with conservative leanings, it will be hard," said Senator Charles E. Schumer, the New York Democrat who serves on the judiciary panel. "But if the candidate is a hard right-wing candidate, it will not be that hard. The more the hard right rattles its sabers, the more resolved our caucus is not to cave."

Note the advance signaling from the minority party. Perhaps its best hope is to cow the President into nominating someone the other side will be willing to give the magic label "mainstream." I suspect that the Shumers of the Senate will tend to say that any Bush nominee is not "mainstream," but the believability of the nearly inevitable "not mainstream" rhetoric will depend on how far from liberal preferences the nominee seems to be. We did not want to have to filibuster, and if only the President had heeded our plea and nominated a mainstream candidate....