The NFL opener coincided with the start of negotiations among members of the congressional supercommittee, tasked with crafting a long-term financial plan for our country. Unfortunately, the prospects for a crowd-pleasing, conciliatory ending seem much less likely.

This powerful committee held its first public hearing on Tuesday. Its "fans" -- corporate lobbyists of all stripes -- went wild, rushing the Capitol and positioning to get the biggest bang for their clients' bucks. One candidly revealed his best offensive strategy: "writing 12 really large checks." No doubt prominent campaign contributors of past elections, like the telecom giant AT&T and the abortion-rights advocate Emily's List, are also expecting front-row seats.

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On September 23, 41-year-old convicted murderer Teresa Lewis became the first woman executed in the United States in over five years, when the State of Virginia administered a lethal injection into her arm.  That occurred only because the Supreme Court, two days earlier refused, by a 7-2 vote, to stay her execution.  Lewis' lawyers argued that execution was unjust because "she is borderline mentally retarded, with the intellectual ability of about a 13-year-old," because she "had been used by a much smarter conspirator," because she had no prior history of violence and had been a model prisoner, and because "the two men who fired the shots received life terms."  The two "liberal" justices on the Court -- Ginsburg and Sotomayor -- voted to stay the execution, but Elena Kagan voted with Scalia, Thomas, Alito, Roberts, Kennedy, and Breyer to allow it to proceed. It's impossible to know for certain how Justice Stevens would have voted, but he did proclaim in a 2008 decision that he believes the death penalty to be unconstitutional pursuant to the Constitutional bar on "cruel and unusual punishment".

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In other words, the supposedly safe, moderate-appearing, blank slate nominee (Kagan) received fewer confirmation votes, and was less politically popular, than the supposedly risky, clearly liberal nominee with a long record of judicial opining and controversial statements (Sotomayor). Aren't there important lessons in those facts? Doesn't that rather clearly contradict the endless excuse-making from the Democratic establishment that muddled moderation is politically necessary? If you're going to attract a tiny handful of GOP votes no matter what, why not nominate someone who will enliven the public, inspire your base, and provide an opportunity to advocate and defend a progressive judicial philosophy?

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My advocacy against the choice of Elena Kagan to replace Justice Stevens largely ceased once she was selected because, as I always acknowledged, her confirmation would be virtually inevitable if she were chosen.  So uninspiring was Kagan's nomination that one should be forgiven for not having noticed that the Senate yesterday confirmed her appointment to the Supreme Court.  It was actually painful watching progressive Democratic Party judicial advocacy groups trying dutifully to pretend with their Press Releases yesterday that there was something significant or exciting to celebrate.  In any event, I'd like to make two points about this episode.

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The vote was 63-37 for President Barack Obama's nominee to succeed retired Justice John Paul Stevens.

Five Republicans joined all but one Democrat and the Senate's two independents to support Kagan. In a rarely practiced ritual reserved for the most historic votes, senators sat at their desks and stood to cast their votes with "ayes" and "nays."

Kagan watched the vote with her Justice Department colleagues in the solicitor general's conference room, the White House said.

Kagan isn't expected to alter the ideological balance of the court, where Stevens was considered a leader of the liberals.

But the two parties clashed over her nomination. Republicans argued that Kagan was a political liberal who would be unable to be impartial. Democrats defended her as a highly qualified legal scholar.

She is the first Supreme Court nominee in nearly 40 years with no experience as a judge, and her swearing-in will mark the first time in history that three women will serve on the nine-member court together.

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Democrats praised President Barack Obama's nominee as a highly qualified legal scholar who would add a sorely needed note of fairness and commonsense to a court whose conservative majority, they argue, has run amok. Republicans charged she's an inexperienced cipher who would use her post to mold the law to her own liberal beliefs.

Despite the partisan divide, Kagan was on track for easy confirmation with the support of nearly all Democrats and a handful of GOP senators. In line to become the court's fourth woman, she's not expected to alter the ideological balance of the court in succeeding retired Justice John Paul Stevens, a leader of its liberal wing.

"She made clear she'll base her approach to deciding cases on the law and the Constitution -- not on politics, not on an ideological agenda," said Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., the chairman of the Judiciary Committee.

He called her views "mainstream," and said she has "demonstrated her respect for the rule of law, her appreciation for the separation of powers, and her understanding of the meaning of our Constitution."

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Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama is previewing his case against Kagan in a letter to senators the day before the Senate begins debating her nomination.

A vote to confirm President Barack Obama's nominee is planned by the end of the week, with virtually all Democrats and a handful of Republicans expected to be in favor.

Sessions calls Kagan's lack of judicial experience a "dramatic deficit," and says she would try to mold the law to her liberal beliefs. He charges she's worked to increase the availability of abortions and is hostile to gun rights.

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Nelson will vote for cloture, though, so this is an entirely symbolic gesture, and what it symbolizes is, "Ben Nelson is an obnoxious political coward."

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Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama is warning fellow senators to "be careful" about backing President Barack Obama's nominee, who's expected to be confirmed easily next week.

He says Americans won't forgive senators who vote to "impose a legal progressive activist legislator from the bench upon them."

Sessions' latest and strongest speech denouncing Kagan comes shortly after Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine became the fourth Republican to announce she'd break with her party to support Obama's nominee.

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The Indiana Republican's position doesn't alter the positive outlook for Kagan, who was already on track to be confirmed early next month. Democrats have more than enough votes to push through her nomination, and Republican foes have shown little inclination -- despite pressure from conservative groups -- to block the move through a filibuster.

Lugar's announcement is the latest in what's expected to be a trickle of support among the Senate's band of GOP moderates for President Barack Obama's choice to succeed retired Justice John Paul Stevens.

In a statement, Lugar said he'd carefully followed Kagan's confirmation hearing testimony and the debate about her nomination, including recommendations from his constituents, and concluded that she is up to the job.

"I have concluded that Solicitor General Elena Kagan is clearly qualified to serve on the Supreme Court and that she has demonstrated a comprehensive knowledge of court history and decisions," Lugar said.

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In a written statement, Obama said Kagan is one of the country's leading legal minds and that she would be a fair and impartial justice if ultimately confirmed by the full Senate. Obama says the solicitor general understands how the high court's decisions affect everyday people's lives.

The committee voted 13-6 in favor of Kagan. Only one Republican, South Carolina's Lindsey Graham, supported her.

Obama said he looked forward to the full Senate voting on her nomination before Congress goes on its summer recess.

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The 13-6 vote sends Kagan's nomination to the full Senate, where she's expected to be confirmed as early as next week to succeed retiring Justice John Paul Stevens.

Just one Republican, Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, joined panel Democrats in supporting President Barack Obama's second Supreme Court nominee. A few more Republicans are likely to back her in the full Senate, where Democrats have more than enough votes to confirm her.

Most GOP senators argue that Kagan would put her political views ahead of the law. They also point to what they call her liberal agenda on such issues as abortion and gun rights.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Elena Kagan faces the first vote on her nomination to the Supreme Court before a Senate panel dominated by Democrats who are all but certain to support her. The only real question is whether she will get any Republican votes.

As the Senate Judiciary Committee met Tuesday, Sen. Jeff Sessions, the panel's top GOP member, said he would oppose Kagan, saying she has placed her politics above the law, lacks experience and has activist judicial heroes.

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The car he hit belonged to the executive editor of NY1, and he hit it just outside its offices. Estimated damage: $3,000. A bicyclist took down Schneiderman's license plate number.

Schneiderman insisted he didn't realize he'd just hit a reporter's parked car. Upon being confronted by the vehicle's owner, he said he had disciplined the staffer driving him. That staffer, his driver, is named Rachel Kagan. She is, yes, the niece of Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan.

NY1, as you can imagine, has been all over this story. Schneiderman appeared on the channel two more times to apologize, defend his response, and criticize the station's reporting.

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This summer's debate over Kagan's nomination has taken on a particularly partisan tinge because it's taking place just months before fall elections, even though her confirmation is not in serious doubt.

Last year, many Republicans stayed publicly uncommitted for weeks about how they would vote on Justice Sonia Sotomayor, President Barack Obama's first pick for the high court.

This time around, however, with the president's popularity sagging and GOP senators eager to draw strong contrasts with him and other Democrats, several who are facing re-election have been quick to announce their plans to vote "no" on Kagan.

They include Arizona Sen. John McCain, Alaska's Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Sen. Johnny Isakson of Georgia and Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina.

All were opponents of Sotomayor's last year when she won just nine Republican votes. But most waited until later in the game to announce how they would vote, including Murkowski, who held out until the day before the roll call.

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The Arizona senator's decision makes him the latest in the GOP to oppose President Barack Obama's nominee to succeed retiring Justice John Paul Stevens.

McCain says Kagan is unlikely to exercise judicial restraint, based on her decision as dean of Harvard Law School to bar military recruiters from the campus career services office because of the ban on openly gay soldiers.

Democrats have more than enough votes to confirm Kagan. So far, no Republican has announced plans to back her.

McCain is outlining his opposition in an opinion article to be published in Thursday's editions of USA Today.

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The $476 million total Kagan reached for the "Setting the Standard" campaign was a record not just for her university but for all law schools. Harvard Law sought $400 million to add professors, buildings, programs and financial aid, and Kagan was in charge of pulling it off. She raised about $303 million from 2003-08, after her predecessor had pulled in $170 million toward the goal.

Kagan's prolific fundraising sets her apart from the current Supreme Court justices. To raise that kind of money, Kagan drew on interpersonal skills honed working in the highly competitive environments of the Clinton White House and law school faculties.

She did it by reaching out to lawyers, corporate executives and others from the law school and broader legal and business communities. "She raised the money basically purely on her personality," said Harvard Law graduate David Mandelbaum, a trustee of real estate giant Vornado Realty Trust and part owner of the Minnesota Vikings football team. He declined to reveal how much he gave.

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This week's Senate confirmation hearings were America's first and probably last chance for an in-depth conversation with Elena Kagan, who most likely will soon vanish into the cloistered corridors of the Supreme Court.

Judging, she told the Senate Judiciary Committee, is "not a robotic or automatic enterprise." Nor were Kagan's answers. Even one of her toughest questioners, Republican Jeff Sessions of Alabama, said her responses had revealed her "gifts and graces" -- though without telling senators much about how she'd rule.

She fielded legal questions of every variety, comfortable enough to admit it when she hadn't a clue about a particular case and savvy enough to clam up when she knew an answer could get her in hot water.

"I have a feeling if I do that, I'm going to end up doing many things that I regret," Kagan said as she declined one senator's invitation to state an opinion. She deflected any number of questions, to the frustration of the questioners.

At the same time, Kagan framed her answers in plainspoken language that suggested this product of Yale, Oxford and Harvard still had her feet on the ground.

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By the third day of the Elena Kagan hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, the Washington press corps had pretty much moved onto other things. Two days earlier, journalists had crowded the room where Kagan, President Obama's nominee to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens, faced committee members in what was billed as her only remotely serious public discussion of the court and her likely role on it.

Talking Points Memo mentioned the journalistic drop-off in a terse item titled "Media Losing Interest?" I promptly tweeted along with a comment about "Journalism's short attention span" -- and got a Twitter reply from Howard Weaver, who said, "I wouldn't staff Kagan hearings if it were my call. It's all Kabuki theater; if any news manages to emerge, it will be reported."

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This is newsworthy? Cue reference to that infamous Christopher Hitchens essay in Vanity Fair, in which he started from the premise that women weren't funny, or simply not as funny as men, and proceeded to pretend to investigate why. (His answer? Men don't get laid if they can't make a lady laugh, but all ladies have to do to attract similar attentions is stand there. Boffo for them.)

The subtext of all "Women: Funny? Discuss" pieces seems to be that women can trade on their sensuality or their humor but not both. Should we pile on with a list? Paula Poundstone, Ellen DeGeneres, Fran Lebowitz, Nora Ephron -- the criteria for a career in comedy used to be that you not be conventionally attractive in the eyes of conventional men.

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