Frontrunner Kagan Would Tilt Court Further Right

The smart money's on Elena Kagan to be President Obama's pick as John Paul Stevens' replacement on the Supreme Court. The solicitor general is "exceptionally smart" with loads of qualifications and expertise, writes Glenn Greenwald, but she'd be a disaster for liberals. The former dean of Harvard Law School is simply too conservative on too many issues, and trading her for Stevens would shift the court "decisively to the right for decades to come."

Kagan is “renowned for accommodating and incorporating conservative views, the kind of ‘post-ideological’ attribute Obama finds so attractive," Greenwald writes for Salon. The presidents tends to avoid picking candidates who are "friendly to the left" for key posts, but he should make an exception here. It's the only hope of keeping the court's "fragile ideological balance" from tilting rightward.
(More Elena Kagan stories.)