Here’s what an administration type says about the Alito nomination (quoting roughly): “We’re off to a good start. Not a negative word has ever been said about this guy in his whole career. The Democrats are going to look pretty foolish, when they were undecided up to the last minute on Roberts, saying they needed more information, and now they are making a determination about Alito within minutes. I don’t think there’s going to be a filibuster. We’re going to occupy the space between the 30-yard lines on this thing. Do Democrats want to be where Chuck Schumer and Ted Kennedy are? I don’t think Ben Nelson and Bill Nelson want to be there. The president has usually been at around 47-53% He’s at 39-40% now. Two big things brought him down, Katrina and the government response to it and the Harriet Miers nomination. After this nomination, he can probably pick up 7-8 points over the next couple of months.”