Obama SC nominee Sotomayor - Part III

Confirmation hearings on Sonia ["wise Latina"] Sotomayor’s US Supreme Court nomination continue apace with, unlike SC appointments in Canuckistan, lots and lots of commentary from all quarters.

Why should Canadians care? Lorne Gunter:

... two reasons: First, American judicial trends -- especially the liberal ones -- have a way of creeping into our own legal system. An activist U. S. high court would encourage our own judges to be even more activist than they already are.

... mostly I think we should be fascinated with her confirmation for the insight it is providing into liberal legalthink [in particular liberal double standards] ... If Sonia Sotomayor were a conservative white male, she likely would not be confirmed as a justice on the U. S. Supreme Court ...

A liberal law professor:

I was completely disgusted by Judge Sotomayor's testimony today. If she was not perjuring herself, she is intellectually unqualified to be on the Supreme Court. If she was perjuring herself, she is morally unqualified.

Barack Obama’s email [Yes, I get email from POTUS]:

It's important for these hearings to be about Judge Sotomayor's own record and her capacity for the job — not any political back and forth that some in Washington may use to distract you.
[Translation: "Don’t listen to the critics." Actually, the nomination hearings involving "political back and forth" is the essence of the process, an intensely political one - hardly a mere "distraction".]

Update: Thomas Sowell.

More "wise Latina" foolishness

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor has voiced her dopey "wise Latina" sentiments before. Rich Lowry points to a version from a speech in 1999:

... I accept the proposition that a difference will be made by the presence of women on the bench and that my experiences will affect the facts that I choose to see as a judge.

She said under questioning yesterday that her words declaring the superiority of non-white female judges were merely "aspirational". That seems unlikely.

Obama nominates foolish Latina woman

Jonah Goldberg comments on Obama’s latest first pick for the Supreme Court:

From the self-parody file:

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life." -Judge Sonia Sotomayor, in her Judge Mario G. Olmos Law and Cultural Diversity Lecture at the University of California (Berkeley) School of Law in 2001

A foolish, sexist, racist judge - just what’s needed in Obama’s post-racial America.

Update [via]:


See also more Goldberg, Goldberg and Charles Krauthammer.

And scaramouche [via].