We're into the second morning session, which now begins the second round of twenty minute sessions all Senators will have to ask questions of Alito.

Leahy started out. He expressed his unease at the way Alito has backed away from previous positions the dot his history as a lawyer. He went right to the issue of presidential power, carefully leading Alito through a series of considerations that point to Alito's confusion, according to Leahy about what Justice Jackson said about the twillight area between circumstances that heighten and don't heighten presidential power. He then went to Hamdi, I think it's Hamdi and read a majority opinion by Justice O'Connor, and a dissenting one by Justice Thomas and asked Alito which one he agrees with. Naturally, Alito slip slid away from saying anything too definite.

Leahy will never produce fireworks, that is simply not in his nature, but I remember that in questioning Bork, his quiet, steady, non-legalistic style was deadly effective.

Hatch comes out swinging.

He's contentious, annoyed, and sharply abrasive about "liberal interest groups," whom he accuses of lying, and other unfair practices, burning up the airwaves and cyperspace with scurrilous, untrue, assertions about Alito, that depend on cherrypicked cases and out of context quotes. Hatch should know, no one is better at exactly that kind of argumentation, and through-out his twenty minutes he demonstrates his mastery of scurrilous assertion based on carefully selected proofs that are partial, and often distorted.

Even while he's in attack mode, Hatch is bristling with defensiveness. Odd. Although the ready outrage is SOP for conservatives these days, it's surprising to see him attacking his fellow Senators on the committee for daring to ask questions.

It'll be worth waiting the transcript for Hatch's question period, he's moving too fast and in too detailed a manner for me to do more than summarize. The upshot - Alito is right at the center of the mainstream, his critics can barely be considered to be true Americans.

One by one, Hatch asserts the superior values of Alito, his honesty, humility, mainstreamedness in that he won't legislate from the bench, and that it's wrong to look at the results of his ruling, if he rules that way, it's only because his reading of the law and the constitution and the Supreme Court precedents is invariably right and just.

Feel reassured? One example, the Chittester case doesn't really restrict anything, and in other cases Alito has found for parties who were female, or minority, or the little guy, end of discussion. You can check out this Progress Report from the Center For American Progress for a different point of view.

Hatch does a real number on the outrage of Democrats bringing up Vanguard and recusal again and again. This makes him furious...what's so discuss. Everyone agrees that he's a moral giant, why are these partisan pygmies attacking him. Turns out making a promise under oath is a relative matter. Who knew?

Kennedy is up, and he goes right at the Vanguard issue, explaining he hadn't planned to focus on that, but given that he was the committee Chairman to whom Alito made that pledge, and in light of Hatch's attack on all questions about Vanguard...trust me, a delicious moment. What Kennedy wants to know, when Alito made the promise, for how long did he think it was operative, when did he think his sworn oath was up? Naturally, he gets no answer, how can Alito remember what he thought at the time. This time, the dance is more like a gigue than a minuet.

Kennedy wants to talk again about that Princeton organization CAP. No, Alito still doesn't remember much about joining it, or why. Kennedy reads a devastating series of articles about or statements by the organization, devastating for the extremity of its rejection fairly mainstream positions about the rights of women and minorities. Alito disavows that his own belief mirror in anyway one particular sets of statements. Kennedy doesn't look particular relieved.

Woops...this isn't going to be pro forma stuff...time out while I go and watch what's going on, (as opposed to listening)....

Wow. You'll want to look for this on the news tonight. Kennedy wants the committee to subpoena William Rusher's (editor of the National Review at one time, big-time conservative) which are in residence at the Library of Congress to check out if there is more information there about Alito's role in CAP. Think I got that right. Appears Kennedy had sent to Specter in December making he request. He renews it now.

Specter is livid. He claims he didn't receive it...you'll see this bit on the news I'm betting...it's left up on the air, though Specter promises to consider the possibilities.

Grassly up, last Senator before lunch. Same old, same old, as he admits, but then Republicans are forced into this because of the Democrat's nastiness. It's a less brittle but still bristling repeat of the Hatch material..

Tensions are high today. Just adjourning for lunch is turning out to be difficult. Senator Durbin wishes to have two minutes to answer a comment about his presentation this morning that Senator Coburn had a response to in his own presentation, Durbin wants to correct the record, Specter prefers he do it after lunch, since Coburn isn't there right now, which Durbin agrees to, but not before mild-mannered Leahy expresses his own dismay about Coburn's remark, which was made while Durbin was gone.

After an all too brief they, and we shall return