[Polls]

Americans Heart Alito, Sort of

A recent poll from WaPo-ABC is inadvertently revealing. The findings are positive(-ish) for Alito--49% support confirmation and only 30% oppose. In reading these leaves, the Post characterizes the response as a "reason for concern. Initial public reaction to Alito was considerably less favorable than it has been to a number of other successful court nominees, according to Post-ABC News polls."

Then the article goes on to blithely note that 44% say his views appear "about right." Here we come to the inadvertent part. Almost no Americans have the vaguest clue about constitutional law. This is no finding at all. If you asked people an opinion on quantum physics, you would indeed have results to report. They would mean nothing, of course, but you could still put them in an article. (An interesting follow-up would be to ask two or three questions about the commerce clause, say, as a filter. But then you'd have to poll a million people just to get a decent sample size.)

The revealing part is this: the only way to derail a nomination is for moderate senators to feel that the danger from voter backlash is great enough that the goodie bag of novel conservative rulings the judge may deliver won't be worth it. But the people are unlikely to evince the outrage necessary to provoke such a backlash ... because they're ignorant of constitutional law.

So it's back to the spin, with Dems (accurately) describing Alito as a wildly inventive, dangerous jurist and Republicans pointing out how gracious and courtly he is.