Senators Pitch Slow and Easy to Alito

"I was," the nominee admitted.

Hatch persisted: "Did you enjoy your time in the ROTC and in the Army afterward?"

Alito confessed: "I was proud to be a member."

Even then, Hatch had not finished using his fierce prosecutorial skills. He turned to the accusation that Alito did not recuse himself from cases where there was a potential conflict of interest. "There was never any possibility of you benefiting financially, no matter how that case came out," Hatch accused. "Is that right?"

ALITO: "There was absolutely no chance and -- "

HATCH: "You actually did recuse yourself when the question was eventually raised, even though you didn't have to?"

ALITO: "That's correct, Senator."

Rephrasing the question, Hatch continued. "And so you went farther than you were legally or ethically mandated to do?" he probed.

"I did, Senator."

But Hatch was still unclear. "So let me just clarify this one more time, and you tell me if this accurately describes the situation," he began. "You did not believe that you were ethically or legally required to recuse yourself in this case. All the ethics experts agree with you. Yet you recused yourself anyway when the issue was raised. . . . Does that about sum it up?"

"That's correct, Senator."

"Well," Hatch concluded, "I have to say, judge, that you went above and beyond your ethical duties here."

A recess was called, and Hatch rushed to the microphones outside. "As you can see, this is one whale of an attorney here, one whale of a judge," he said. "Judge Alito is a brilliant jurist. He's a straight shooter. He's as ethically honest and decent as any judge on the federal bench today. . . . I think these are some of the most succinct and intelligent statements ever made about the philosophy of judging in any Supreme Court nomination hearing."

Perhaps. But nobody's saying the same thing of the questions.