The Supreme Challenge: Zero Visuals Times 9

The John Roberts nomination has revived an age-old dilemma for television news: how to cover nine secluded lawyers in black robes.

"Supreme Court arguments and decisions are fascinating to a few of us and really pretty boring to most," says MSNBC's Dan Abrams.

"The Supreme Court deals overwhelmingly with abstractions, and ideas and abstractions are not easy to convey on television," says CNN's Jeff Toobin.

"The minutiae of it, how people interpret statutes, that's not the most exciting stuff," says Fox's Greta Van Susteren.

If three of cable's best legal commentators, all lawyers, struggle with the subject, imagine how difficult it is for all the other anchors, correspondents and producers.

The amount of airtime devoted to untangling court decisions has been dwarfed by the cases involving Martha Stewart, Michael Jackson and Kobe Bryant, not to mention wife killer Scott Peterson, runaway bride Jennifer Wilbanks and missing-in-Aruba Natalee Holloway. By contrast, major court rulings on medical marijuana, racially influenced jury selection and government seizure of private property tend to be one- or two-day stories at best.

Television reports on these high-court rulings were also eclipsed by all those speculative stories about William Rehnquist stepping down (he isn't) and whether President Bush would pick Edith Clement or some other judge besides Roberts for the Sandra Day O'Connor vacancy (he didn't).

Just as political reporters cover campaigns far more than governing, the Roberts selection provides the media with a clear story line -- whether the Senate will confirm the appeals court judge. But with no Clarence Thomas-style controversy to feast upon, the networks could quickly tire of examining the details of Roberts's record and judicial philosophy.

"He's distinguished himself in his career, but there's no novelty associated with him," Van Susteren says. "We've had white men who've gone to Harvard and been at the top of their class and are smart."

On Wednesday, the day after the Roberts announcement, Van Susteren, who has camped out in Aruba several times, did four Holloway segments on her "On the Record" program and one -- an interview with John McCain -- on the court vacancy.

"I see it as a lesson in how we collect evidence," says Van Susteren, whose ratings have soared since Holloway's disappearance in late May. "Far more people are going to be touched by trial courts and police investigations than by Supreme Court decisions. I would not be so arrogant to think that only the Supreme Court matters. More people now know about Aruban law than they ever did before."

The "Abrams Report" led with Holloway on Wednesday, did one segment on Roberts and then moved on to new allegations against the murderer of 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford. Abrams says he wrestles with "balancing" such stories every day.