Alito Goes a Long Way: But He's Still No John Roberts. - According to the article, Alito is being critiqued continually with respect to former chief justice Roberts. The author believes that Alito fails to stand up to that status of Roberts, writing "Roberts stole all the best lines and the best jokes and the best legal theories." Even if this were the case, Roberts is no longer chief justice, and if Alito is expected to be an equal manifestation of Roberts, those who make the expection will be dissapointed. Alito will have to develop his own pragmatic style and prudence in the court, even though many are expecting him to live up to their own great image of Roberts.
In his opening statement, Alito spoke about how he grew up from humble beginnings and went on to Princeton, where he witnessed smart and privileged people abusing their responsibilities. This could be seen as an attack on Elite Theory, which holds that society is ruled by a small number of people exercising power only in their self interest. Alito witnessed privileged people acting only for their self interests, and he was appauled by this. Alito probably places Roberts into this category, commenting that Roberts was superflous in his actions and character, while Alito himself is truly humble. This seems to indicate that Alito believes that he himself will serve the public interest better than Roberts did, since he doesn't consider himself to be an elitist.