From National Journal's May 30 cover story:

The New York Yankees, the baseball team that Sonia Sotomayor says she adores, was among the first to use the squeeze play to great and showy effect nearly a century ago, occasionally even getting two runs with one well-executed maneuver. Senators shouldn't be surprised, then, that President Obama and his Supreme Court nominee know how to piece together victories.

As things stood at week's end, the president had the support of his own team to get Sotomayor touching home plate by the fall. Beginning next week during private meetings with senators, the 54-year-old Appeals Court judge will effectively begin the real "hearings" process, when Republican senators question her in one-on-one conversations that will shape their opinions well before the Judiciary Committee gavels open her confirmation hearings. They'll ask about empathy and her decisions during 11 years on the Appeals bench, and they'll look for any chinks serious enough to disqualify the first Hispanic, who is also only the fourth woman nominated to the Court....

Conservative activists outside the Senate lost no time assailing Sotomayor as a closet liberal well beyond the mainstream who would eagerly try to make law once confirmed. But Senate Republicans, most of them far from Washington during the Memorial Day recess, kept their instant assessments in check while studying Sotomayor's record and weighing whether a vote to oppose a Hispanic woman would haunt them politically. Some Republican advocacy groups and activists conceded that defeating Obama's choice would be tough.

"The administration wants to put a squeeze on senators and make it politically hard to oppose her," said Wendy Long, general counsel for the conservative Judicial Confirmation Network. "We want to make sure senators evaluate her without regard to demographic consideration, honestly and fairly on the merits."

"Good luck" was the refrain from Senate Democrats who are gearing up to help the White House secure the nomination of a woman who has been on liberals' short list of Supreme Court candidates for years. While they're at it, Democrats are trying to pit social conservatives against GOP moderates -- factions already arm-wrestling over their party's direction in the wake of two disastrous election cycles.

Subscribers to National Journal can read the rest of the story here.