From today's edition of the CW-loving Note:

There's plenty there to keep his attention:...a storyline is developing around Judge Sonia Sotomayor that can at least make the hearings more interesting.

If you even have to ask whether the “developing” storyline has to do with the “Latina woman” quote, then you have not been paying attention. Because Judge Sonia Sotomayor, who has more federal bench experience than any SCOTUS nominee in a 100 years, has been nominated and the press (taking its cue from the GOP) couldn't care less about her legal record. The press (taking its cue from the GOP) only cares about an eight-year-old quote, which the press will only reference if all context has been surgically removed.

That's what the nomination story revolves around. Period.

And now the crew at The Note is giddy because a new wrinkle to the “Latina woman” story has been added and will “at least make the hearings more interesting.”

That, my friends, is the money quote of the last two weeks. Because in it, the Note acknowledges what other journalists will not, which is the entire point of the press coverage is make sure the hearings are interesting. That's all the press cares about. Period. And will do whatever it takes to prop up phony “drama.”

As I noted earlier:

The press has already penciled in weeks' worth, if not months' worth, of Supreme Court nomination coverage for this summer. Married to the idea that Senate hearings hold the promise of dissolving into the wild pie fights, like the raucous affairs that unfolded during the dramatic Clarence Thomas and Robert Bork showdowns, the Beltway press relentlessly hypes these stories even though, as more recent nominations have shown, the hearings themselves turn out to be wildly anticlimactic.

Worse for the press was the fact that early indications from key Republican senators last week were that Sotomayor faced a relatively easy confirmation “battle” and that excluding some type of unforeseen personal scandal, she was good as confirmed.

Where's the drama in that? How are reporters and pundits supposed to gobble up endless hours of TV talk time by simply marveling at how Obama picked an eminently qualified judge who garnered bipartisan Senate support?