Solicitor General Elena Kagan's critics failed to deliver a striking blow to her nomination to the Supreme Court, making her confirmation a near-certainty later this month, but she may receive scant bipartisan support, according to senators and aides involved in this week's confirmation hearings.

The sessions before the Senate Judiciary Committee concluded Thursday with testimony from outside advocates and legal experts, following Kagan's testimony earlier in the week. The panel will vote on the nomination after the Senate returns from its week-long Fourth of July break, sending her nomination to the full chamber in late July.
Senior Republican aides said there appeared to be little desire to try to block her nomination through a filibuster. But the nominee's critics -- including one Senate Democrat and some liberal civil rights groups -- said they found her testimony lacking in detail, as she avoided explicitly revealing her views, an approach followed in confirmation hearings by her predecessors over nearly two decades.
“So far it's been a winning hand, but it's not been good for the country, the court or the Constitution, and certainly not the Congress,” said Sen. Arlen Specter (D-Pa.), who opposed Kagan's confirmation as solicitor general 16 months ago when he was the committee's ranking Republican.
Specter, who may again oppose Kagan, said in an interview Thursday that the nominee uttered “pure prepared pabulum that comes right out of the White House murder boards.” He said he was particularly upset because, in a 1995 law review article, Kagan lambasted the confirmation process as “vapid” because of the lack of specificity in nominees' answers.
(Source: washingtonpost.com)