Democrat senators’ holds and promised filibusters block another dozen or so nominees. This state of affairs is unprecedented: never before has the Senate denied a judicial nominee a simple up-or-down vote with a filibuster. (No, Abe Fortas’s 1968 nomination to Chief Justice of the Supreme Court doesn’t count; President Johnson, sensing that Fortas would lose an eventual vote to bipartisan opposition, withdrew Fortas’s nomination after four months and one lost cloture vote.)

It is important to double your efforts to get your boss to S-230 on time. Fox News channel is really excited about the marathon. Britt [sic] Hume at 6 would love to open the door to all our 51 Senators walking on to the floor. The producer wants to know, will we walk in exactly at 6:02 when the show starts so we can get it live to open Britt Hume's show? Or, if not, can we give them an exact time for the walk-in start?