NBC’s Political Unit was impressed with the White House’s rollout of President Obama’s first Supreme Court nominee. As they report in First Read:

For Supreme Court nominations, Rollout Day is always important. And — to borrow a metaphor from Sotomayor’s favorite sport — yesterday was a homerun for the Obama White House. In fact, it was as good as the Roberts rollout. A misty-eyed mom? Check. Multiple references to Sotomayor’s humble background? Check. Adding that she saved Major League Baseball? Check. The only thing that seemed to be missing was the apple pie.

Actually, the only thing that seemed to be missing was a concerted attempt to establish Sotomayor’s credentials as an intellectual heavyweight and/or judicial scholar. Instead, the White House message yesterday focused almost exclusively on her early life story: The top-lines in the leaked White House’s talking points focus on her empathy, “American story”, and her “upbringing in a South Bronx housing project” — all worthy of praise and pride, but largely irrelevant to her abilities as a judge.

Notably absent from the rollout was much talk of Sotomayor’s rulings. As CBS’ Chip Reid pointed out on the Evening News, “The President mentioned only one of the hundreds of cases she’s decided, ending the baseball strike….”

The political benefits of highlighting Sotomayor’s personal story are obvious. But I also think building an argument based solely on nominee’s biography is risky, since it makes a potential vetting problem a more severe threat to the nomination. (And, as First Read also reports, “as we learned with Tom Daschle’s HHS nomination, nothing is ever a sure thing in American politics.”)

Also – while I’m on the topic of the Sotomayor rollout – why was David Axelrod the White House’s designated surrogate on cable TV yesterday? In a pick that some critics already are suggesting smacks of political opportunism, isn’t the President’s political adviser the worst possible messenger?