From this morning's Earlybird:

• "Solicitor General Elena Kagan's membership in an exclusive club is causing trouble for her Supreme Court nomination. But that is unlikely to defer future applicants," the Washington Post reports. "Kagan is part of a vast network of lawyers of all political persuasions who clerked for a Supreme Court justice."

• "Two of the most influential justices ever to sit on the Supreme Court -- Thurgood Marshall and Antonin Scalia -- probably couldn't get confirmed to the bench today." Roll Call (subscription) reports. "So say scholars and Senators who argue that the high court has turned into such a political battleground that recent presidents now eschew nominating individuals like Marshall and Scalia."