First, here alleged ties to Goldman Sachs.
Solicitor General Elena Kagan was a member of the Research Advisory Council of the Goldman Sachs Global Markets Institute, according to the financial disclosures she filed when President Obama appointed her last year to her current post. Kagan served on the Goldman panel from 2005 through 2008, when she was dean of Harvard Law School, and received a $10,000 stipend for her service in 2008, her disclosure forms show.
The advisory board position that Kagan held from 2005 to 2008 and here status and position on the board is in no way connected with practices that Goldman Sachs is being investigated for. However, the name alone is going to cause conservatives to shape a storyline that Kagan is connected in some fashion to the economic decline simply because of proximity.
If that be the case, it would certainly begin to tear away at the conservative narrative that the Obama administration is "punishing" banks and actually defending Goldman Sachs. If they are going to approach Kagan's confirmation from the point of view that what Goldman did was wrong, they are going to have to pull off some very elaborate rhetorical acrobatics. Then again, conservatives have very short memories so they will likely be focusing on what is said in order to slander Kagan rather than how context plays a very important role. When it comes to making Democrats look bad - all bets are off for what conservatives have previously said.
Second, her virtual lack of a "paper-trail" is going to translate to "lack of experience" to conservatives.
One of the difficulties in assessing Kagan's judicial philosophy and view of the Constitution is that direct evidence is extremely sparse. That's not only because she's never been a judge, but also because (a) her academic career is surprisingly and disturbingly devoid of writings or speeches on most key legal and Constitutional controversies, and (b) she has spent the last year as Obama's Solicitor General, where (like any lawyer) she was obligated to defend the administration's policies regardless of whether she agreed with them.
Considering conservatives have recently rediscovered the Constitution after Obama was elected, Kagan's lack of writings on the Constitution will likely play a huge role in her confirmation process. But considering her ability to actively engage in constitutional issues ( like the Citizens United case ) proves that she's got the knowledge and the ability to replace Stevens.
I'm sure, however, that we will likely hear from conservatives that due to her lack of writings on the Constitution that she is some sort of "rogue", a "radical". Hey, who else did they label a "radical"? Oh, yeah.
Also, I'm sure that Breitbart or Hannity will suddenly have some long-lost video footage about her making some comment regarding women and the decision making process. Then we are likely to hear specious claims about someone she may have been in the same room with that has a peculiar past of their own - maybe someone she worked indirectly with at Harvard. It's a pretty open playing field for conservatives right now, and I'm sure it will get interesting very quickly.
Of course, there will also be the third aspect of the confirmation process - though this will be in the public realm ( talk radio and blogs primarily ) - that will likely be echo to an extend on Capital Hill: pointless name calling.
This is generally used as a second wave of attack when conservatives see that their ideological blatherings are having no discernible effects. But considering that we are dealing with a white woman who has apparently no specific ties to any group/organization that conservatives love to use as a racial weapon, the name-calling could either be quite ineffective and muted or could be so over-the-top that it will dominate at least 4 news cycles.
That being said, and considering how Kagan has flow below the radar to a certain extent, I'm quite curious as to how Beck is going to start handling this. I'm sure the words "socialist" and "communist" will come up several times throughout his two programs.
But back to the Constitution, Kagan faces a challenge that Sotomayor didn't face - the Constitutionality of healthcare reform:
As soon as President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act into law, right-wing governors, attorneys general, and state lawmakers immediately began pushing measures to nullify the new health care benefits. However, even many conservative legal scholars acknowledged that their argument for the unconstitutionality of health reform was “weak” and nothing more than a political stunt. Nullification efforts around the country have largely lost momentum and failed to pass.
Nevertheless, this morning on Fox News, Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY) said that he wants to make this fringe view of health care reform a centerpiece of Solicitor General Elena Kagan’s Supreme Court confirmation hearing:
Considering how well Kagan handled herself when discussion Citizens United, I'm sure that she's more than ready to take on a hack like Senator Barrasso.
This isn't going to be an easy confirmation, as conservatives are willing to go full-tilt in trying to derail this. Granted, Kagan isn't this radicalized liberal that she will be characterized as, but the mythos already being created by the conservative movement again shows that they are more than willing to destroy an American life than ensure that their country is bettered.
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