There's a reason why everyone is "judging her based on rumor" - it's because nobody knows for sure anything about her! People are upset because we expected from Bush a committed constructionist/anti-activist jurist and we were given someone with essentially a blank slate.
As to your "fair hearing" schtick, if there is going to be a hearing, of course everyone would want it to be fair. A lot of people would prefer there not to even be a hearing, because if she does get voted down, which right now looks like a pretty good possibility, it would do a lot more harm to Bush than if she withdraws her nomination and he names somebody else.