Ideological Battle

Argument: There are not enough Republican votes in the Senate to win an ideological fight over a nominee like Michael Luttig, Edith Jones, or Janice Rogers Brown.

Mark Levin: The Gang of 14 "did make it much more difficult for the president to win an ideological battle over a Supreme Court nominee."

"The Democrats did, in fact, send warnings that they were prepared to filibuster the second nominee."

"And under such circumstances, the president would have needed 60 votes to confirm his candidate, not 51."

"Today the president would have to persuade seven of the most unreliable Republican senators to trigger the so-called nuclear option in order to clear the way for an up-or-down vote for, say, a Luttig."

"And it's likely the Democrat leadership would have succeeded in convincing at least some (if not most) of the seven Democrat moderates to oppose a rule change."

"I have no doubt that this was part of the White House's political calculation."

Read all of it.
--LynZee