When Pete Williams of NBC broke the news at 10pmET on Sunday night that Elena Kagan would be Pres. Barack Obama‘s Supreme Court nominee, it signaled cable news would make the story a focus in the short and long-term.

So what would be Kagan’s “wise latina” – the storyline closely associated with the nominee? We broke down the first 24 hours on cable news.

Last night Rachel Maddow pondered whether SCOTUS nominee Elena Kagan might be the Left’s Harriet Miers in so far as, will Obama be able to muster the support from his own party to confirm her. All signs point to no on this. However, if there were more Glenn Greenwalds in the party she might have something to worry about. Greenwald told Maddow last night her lack of a paper trail is a huge concern.

While the media brings up all the pros and potential cons to the Elena Kagan Supreme Court nomination, one thing the entire media is likely to embrace is her take on cameras in the courtroom.

The media, right and left, has always been a fan of access – and the Supreme Court is one courtroom where no camera has gone before. Maybe Kagan will change that.

President Obama will announce this morning that his pick for the Supreme Court is Elena Kagan. And now that the speculation game is over (though truthfully, most presumed Kagan would get the nod), the spotlight will quickly shift to her confirmation process. So let’s take a look at the potential conflicts or controversies that might arise in the coming days, or put another way, what will the cablesphere will latch on to in the coming days?

News broke last night that President Obama would be announcing Elena Kagan as his nominee for the US Supreme Court, replacing Justice John Paul Stevens, who announced his retirement last month. While Kagan is a familiar name in both legal and news circles, the interest in who she is has “gone wide” so to speak. So following is a primer of some talking points one can expect to hear in the coming day. And no, do not expect a reprise of the “Wise Latina” meme.

NBC’s Pete Williams is reporting that President Obama plans to nominate Elena Kagan to the US Supreme Court, to succeed Justice John Paul Stevens who announced his retirement last month.

A few weeks back, shortly after Justice Stevens announced his upcoming retirement from the Supreme Court rumors started to swirl (possibly thanks to Politico) that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton may, or at least should be, in the running as his replacement. Today, on Meet the Press, the woman herself weighed in. Let there be no doubt, Hillary is not interested.

Wow. Looking for an example of how fast news flies and how journalists are one man operations these days? Look no further. Check out this fascinating exchange, on Twitter, between ABC News’ Jake Tapper and the ABC World News Twitter feed. (UPDATED.)

Today the Supreme Court struck down a law, 8-1, that prevented video footage of animal cruelty from being bought or sold. While the acts, such as dog fighting, are illegal themselves, marketing the footage no longer is. What kind of videos could you now legally buy on the market? How about this footage Rick Sanchez wants you to see of women crushing kittens to death with their stilettos?

Yesterday, the CBS News website published a column that asserted that Solicitor General Elena Kagan – a leading candidate for the Supreme Court – is in fact gay. In the piece, former Bush administration aide Ben Domenech said that Kagan could potentially be the “first openly gay justice”; pleasing Obama’s base. Howard Kurtz reports that an unidentified administration official “said Kagan is not a lesbian,” and reports that Anita Dunn blasted CBS News for “posting lies.”

I’m not sure how likely it is that President Obama would tap current Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to fill the Supreme Court spot being vacated by Justice Stevens when he retires, or whether Clinton would be at all interested in taking it — she has said that after her current role ends she plans to retire. But, wow, it would be a fascinating pick. And her name has begun popping up.

The U.S. Supreme Court made waves in January when it blocked limits on political spending by corporations – but according to a recent Rasmussen poll, a majority of voters think there’s a bigger problem with politics (hint: check our site’s name).

Now that Justice Stevens has confirmed that he is considering announcing his retirement (perhaps within the month!) the speculation about replacements has begun in earnest. Judging from Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl’s appearance on Fox News Sunday this morning, getting the GOP to approve that nominee is likely not going to be a walk in the park.

On Studio B today, Shep Smith discussed Chief Justice Roberts’ response to President Obama’s SOTU with Judge Andrew Napolitano, who took a rather hard line…against Roberts. Saying, basically, that while it’s nothing new for the President to criticize SCOTUS (at all), it is not okay for any member of the Supreme Court to publicly reply. At all. It’s “unheard of” for the court to reply, says Napolitano.

The awesome Demon Sheep ad — put out by California senate seat seeker Carly Fiorina — left a lot of people wondering whether this was political genius at work, or just amateur ad-making that accidentally went viral. The answer appears to be genius. Is this the future of political advertising?

On Meet the Press yesterday, David Axlerod had this to say about Justice Alito’s SOTU response: “Well, I–look, we–in this weird political season, we’ve become accustomed to unusual outbursts in the chamber during these speeches, so.” Meaning that between the town halls and Joe Wilson, being heckled by a Supreme Court Justice is pretty much par for the course.

This ain’t no Joe Wilson moment. When you’re a Supreme Court justice and you quietly mouth back to a President during his first official State of the Union address the result is a lot of intellectual heavy weights using to oped pages to wrestle over the role of SCOTUS (does everybody now want to be a cable news talking head at heart?) and the appropriateness of the President challenging (threatening?) them in a one-sided public forum.

Political analysts and television pundits are still spinning the State of the Union speech just delivered by President Barack Obama, but it was his stern rebuke of the Supreme Court campaign finance decision of last week that will likely get the most attention.”With all due deference to separation of powers, last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law to open the floodgates for special interests – including foreign corporations – to spend without limit in our elections.” Video after the jump.

Can this be considered the equivalent of a Supreme Court heckle? Close to an hour into his address tonight President Obama called out the Supreme Court’s recent decision to remove all limits on what corporations can spend on an election and to their faces. Justice Alito was not happy.

The New Yorker has jumped in to the Tea Party fray with a longish piece by Ben McGrath, which explores “the social movement that…may have derailed the President’s chief domestic initiative, occurred last fall.” Too little, too late? Hint: No mention of SCOTUS.

There has been so much news in the last two weeks between Haiti, Leno and Conan, Tuesday’s special election in Massachusetts that it’s easy to wonder whether the full impact of yesterday’s radical Supreme Court decision, to lift the limits on how much U.S. corporations can spend on a political campaign, is getting lost in the mix. Rachel Maddow calls it a a lightning bolt into “the entire American political establishment.”

The U.S. Supreme Court refused to lift a temporary ban on broadcasting the Proposition 8 late Wednesday, saying the ban would stay in place until the court had time to consider an appeal brought by supporters of Proposition 8 who don’t want the trial televised. According to long-time Supreme Court reporter Lyle Denniston at SCOTUSblog, the divided 5-4 court chastizing lower courts in its 17-page opinion. for attempting “to change its rules at the eleventh hour.” Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonya Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer and John Paul Stevens dissented from the ruling

Lights! Camera! SCOTUS! All eyes this week are turned toward the confirmation hearing of Justice Sonia Sotomayor.

Mediaite asked some of our favorite legal eagles to share their thoughts on the Sotomayor hearings: The New Yorker/CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin, Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick, CBS’s Andrew Cohen and SCOTUSblog’s Tom Goldstein weigh in on today’s events.