President Obama is reportedly vetting Supreme Court nominees and intends to nominate one despite oaths from Senate Republicans that they will never in a zillion years consider anyone he recommends.
I keep reading articles online that say his goal is to pick a nominee who'll be acceptable to everyone. The trouble with that is that a nominee acceptable to everyone is acceptable to no one. Republicans certainly don't want a Supreme Court Justice who is acceptable to Democrats. They want someone who'll vote so consistently their way that Democrats will hate that person and jump up and down and cuss and turn the color of Heinz Ketchup.
Republicans don't like Justices like Ginsburg and Sotomayor who were nominated by Democratic presidents…but the ones they're really furious at are the ones like Roberts and Kennedy who were nominated by Republican presidents but who occasionally vote with the liberals. Remember when George W. Bush nominated Harriet Miers and Republicans (not Democrats) raised such a stink that he withdrew the nomination? It wasn't because she was a conservative. It was because they were afraid she might not be 100% reliably conservative.
And Democrats don't want someone who'll have an open, non-partisan mind and will rule on the merits on an individual case. That person might sometimes side with the conservatives. He or she might just vote to overturn Roe v. Wade or do something else Democrats dread. They want someone who you can bet the farm will look at every case, weigh the arguments on both sides, then find some way to rule in favor of their side.
Back in school, I was taught that the Supreme Court was supposed to be nine fair-minded individuals who would put personal feelings and prejudices aside and rule based on what the law and common sense decreed. I don't know if it was ever quite that but it was once more that than it is now. An open-minded, fair person ain't got a chance.