"Replacing Justice Stevens"

As most of you know by now, Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens is retiring at the end of the current SCOTUS term.  His replacement should spark a fight in the Senate, given Obama's stated objective to appoint activist judges to the bench who disregard the Constitution.

A word about Justice Stevens.  During the 1970s he was actually a good judge, engaging in the time-honored principle of judicial restraint and generally giving at least a fair nod to original intent.  As the years passed, however, he became basically worthless--an endless source of judicial activism that bore little resemblance to anything the Founders envisioned the high court to be.

So what about his replacement?  Should the GOP mount a concerted, offensive effort to derail any nominee of Obama, given that we know we are going to get an extremist liberal?  Or should the GOP give Obama this one, with the view that he is replacing a liberal and thus reserve the big guns and the big fight for the next Obama nominee, if he gets another chance to do so?

National Review muses on that question.