The media is putting up a smokescreen with depicting Elena Kagan as a “moderate” or of “unclear ideology.” Some have even gone so far as to suggest she may be “conservative,” which is a bizarre claim considering who nominated her. Why else would Obama choose her if not for the fact that she shares most, if not all, of his political views. When you have the most radical and divisive president in history, you can rest assurd that his nominees are a near clone of himself ideologically.

However, there are some bits of rather revealing evidence against her. Kagan would censor political speech, as she argued (for the government) during the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. Concerning this case, Chief Justice Roberts wrote: “The Government urges us in this case to uphold a direct prohibition on political speech. It asks us to embrace a theory of the First Amendment that would allow censorship not only of television and radio broadcasts, but of pamphlets, posters, the Internet, and virtually any other medium that corporations and unions might find useful in expressing their views on matters of public concern.” Futhermore, the Reagan-hating Kagan once said she looked forward to a time when a, “more leftist left will once again come to the fore.” This statement pretty much says it all.

Another potential issue for her may be the fact that “her résumé lacks the one qualification that every member of the current Supreme Court possesses: past judicial service. It has been almost 40 years since a nominee who had not been a judge was appointed to the Supreme Court; the last two were William H. Rehnquist and Lewis F. Powell Jr., both of whom joined the court in 1972.”

Naturally, the media is largely focusing on the irrelevant aspects of Kagan, such as CBS’s Crawford who said “she loves softball and poker” and NBC’s Pete Williams hailed her as an “accomplished poker player, opera lover.” Nothing of which has anything to do with whether or not she understands and respects the Constitution, and the proper role of government and the courts.

Edwin Meese, the U.S. attorney general in the Reagan administration, says a nominee should “demonstrate a thorough fidelity to apply the Constitution as it was written rather than as they would like to rewrite it.” Unfortunately Obama and his nominees do not believe that. Instead, he gives us activists who believe the court should take sides and promote “social justice” and other postmodern vagaries that have no place on the high court.

Meese continues: “The judiciary is not to favor any one group, but to secure justice equally for all through impartial application of the Constitution and laws. Senators should vigorously question Kagan about [earlier] statements to determine whether she is truly committed to the rule of law.”

The Senate should ask her extensive questions about her understanding of the role of a judge, and the constitutional role of the Supreme Court. Specifically, they should inquire as to her understanding that a justice should interpret the Constitution as it reads and statutes as they are written by Congress, without substituting the justice’s own policy preferences or ideas for what the documents actually say.