In The Interests of Charity
As I wrote this morning “If you’re a white guy looking to vent about how Puerto Rican women growing up poor in the Bronx get unfair advantages in life, the conservative movement has a lot to offer you.” Just in time, here’s Michael Goldfarb to prove my point “Does anyone dispute that Sotomayor has been the recipient of preferential treatment for most of her life?”
Jason Zengerle comments:
Honestly. Is there anything in Sotomayor’s background–other than the fact that she’s a Latina–that would lead Goldfarb to such a sweeping conclusion? I’m always reluctant to say someone’s a racist, but I’m really struggling to come up with another explanation here.
Personally, I’m of the view that American pundits are too hesitant to call other people’s statements racist, but in the case of Goldfarb I’m willing to lean toward charity. If you look at the man’s body of work in full, there’s tons of evidence that he’s extremely dim-witted and not that much in the way of racially charged rhetoric.
55 Responses to “In The Interests of Charity”
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May 27th, 2009 at 11:11 am
I always saw Goldfarb as being dim-witted in the way George Allen is dim-witted and this pretty much confirms it. If you are dim-witted AND run around with people who laugh at n*gger jokes, you are going to think it is a positive to tell them.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:12 am
I shall also vote for dimwitted, rather than racist. But it’s a fine line. You know your insensitive friend who keeps making politically incorrect jokes? And then one day he goes too far…
May 27th, 2009 at 11:16 am
“Does anyone dispute that Sotomayor has been the recipient of preferential treatment for most of her life?”
The woman graduated summa cum laude from Princeton.
It simply doesn’t matter what the facts of the matter are to people like Goldfarb. They see a woman or minority in an elevated position, and no matter what that person’s actual accomplishments and resume, he’s going to feel like that person doesn’t belong there.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:17 am
Matthew, you’re not saying that Goldfarb is too dumb to be a racist are you?
an interesting idea.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:17 am
I want to hear what Jonah Goldberg and Bill Kristol have to say about Sonia Sotomayor having everything handed to her.
Life is so unfair. Hispanic people who grow up without fathers in the Bronx get all the breaks.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:22 am
I’ll be charitable and say he is a douche bag.
Look if you are a minority that gets uppity and graduates from law school there are always going to be certain guys like Goldfarb who think that the “gubmint” drove a dump truck full of money to your house so you could attend college, then gave you: a good SAT score, passing grades in undergrad, an undergraduate diploma, a great LSAT score, passing grades in law school, a spot on the law review, a law degree, a passing bar exam score, and all the career moves ever after.
Who cares what he thinks?
May 27th, 2009 at 11:23 am
by the way, i think
“If you’re a white guy looking to vent about how Puerto Rican women growing up poor in the Bronx get unfair advantages in life, the conservative movement has a lot to offer you.”
is one of your best lines ever.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:25 am
“Does anyone dispute that Sotomayor has been the recipient of preferential treatment for most of her life?”
George Bush, Jr. For fuck’s sake, George Bush, Jr. was, technically, President of the United States. Are we through with this nonsense yet?
May 27th, 2009 at 11:25 am
I feel like I could write an in-depth psychological profile of Michael Goldfarb. Do I know anything about psychology? Not really, no. But you wouldn’t need to know much. I feel like I could explain his whole, miserable life to anyone who cared to know.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:29 am
Frankly I don’t know if Sotomayor has received some sort of special treatment, based solely upon identity, all or most or even some of her life. I suspect as much (there are episodes in her past which all but assure it) but so what?
After all take one look at our ObaFuhrer’s career to date.
Or Bushit’s.
What is sad, though no sadder than any recent Supreme’s appointment, is that Sotomayor is just another middlebrow ideologue whose rise will only reinforce Americans’ deep suspicion verging on contempt for what has become only another partisan battle ground.
The surprising thing is ObaFuhrer would choose to so brand his legacy so early on, that he would be so eager to embrace his very own Clarence Thomas.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:31 am
It is her preemption of due process that bothers more than the ballerina act.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:33 am
And of course, Clarence Thomas ascended to the court exclusively on merit.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:37 am
Man, Princeton must be really easy if “middlebrow” intellects can graduate at their top the class.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:41 am
I believe Sotomayor was also valedictorian of her HS class. So actually, I see no point in her resume where we would need preferential treatment to explain anything.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:45 am
“Does anyone dispute that Sotomayor has been the recipient of preferential treatment for most of her life?”
Oh oh! Me! I do!
http://obamalondon.blogspot.com/2009/05/not-so-dumb.html
May 27th, 2009 at 11:45 am
[...] #2: Two more Matt Y posts, one on the Taylor piece and the second on a Michael Goldfarb post that Jason Zengerle also comments [...]
May 27th, 2009 at 11:50 am
A friend of mine, during the campaign, made a similar argument to someone who was arguing that Obama was the beneficiary of affirmative action and special treatment. He pointed out his accomplishments at Harvard, the Law Review, etc. The Republican’s answer? “Well his Harvard education was clearly financed by international Arab terrorists. How else could a guy with his background afford it?”
So there is really no arguing with these people. I mean, leaving aside the issue of loans (and why it is at all logical to assume that “international Arab terrorists” were involved), it also has nothing to do with the issue of Obama’s real accomplishments at Harvard.
But once they see someone who is not white who has done well, they will go twist themselves into an intellectual pretzel to find a way that it must be the result of racial preference by the “real racists.”
May 27th, 2009 at 11:51 am
Does anybody else find this a bit odd: the Weekly Standard is attacking Sotomayor over something she did when she was 19… can you sincerely form an accurate opinion of a 55 year old based on what they did when they were 19?
May 27th, 2009 at 11:52 am
Half the value of the neocon movement to the wider world was that it provided a means or language of objecting to people of inappropriate races (or genders or sexualities or what-have-you)–whether because of race-based policies or because of their race, simply–without being called a racist (or sexist or homophobe or what-have-you). That is, it allowed people who were uncomfortable (sometimes reasonably) with the massive changes taking place to object and object strongly and sometimes very rudely.
It’s entirely reasonable to leave it as an open question whether Goldfarb is a racist, just as it’s entirely reasonable to leave the same open as regards Atwater even in the face of the “n*gg*r, n*gg*r, n*gg*r” comment. It seems crazy to doubt that he (or Atwater) traffics comfortably in racially charged language for the purpose of advancing a political end. And surely that’s worth noting.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:54 am
Not only did she graduate summa from Princeton, she received the Pyne Prize her senior year, which is the highest honor the university gives to undergraduates. As a Princeton alum, I can attest that the people who were awarded the Pyne Prize when I was there could best be described as freakishly smart and terrifyingly hard-working.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
The Pop View @ 2:
I have that friend – insenstive white guy, cracks racist jokes, generally with tongue-firmly-in-cheek. Did it for a long time. Used to be somewhat funny, in a somewhat disconcerting way – because the friend has very good timing and a good sense of humor, and because you didn’t think he was serious.
Then he spent 5 years in the Navy listening to Limbaugh.
The tongue has been removed from the cheek. He still thinks he’s funny. Most of us think he’s a racist asshole. He started believing the jokes.
It’s sad, because he’s actually a sharp guy. He just listens to dumb people.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
I don’t think there is any doubt that Sotomayor received special treatment.
Anyone who attended Princeton or another Ivy got special treatment. There are probably several thousand people just as qualified for every person that is accepted by Princeton.
Sotomayor took a slightly different route than most of her classmates. Typically you have to be from “the right background” to qualify. But Princeton accepts a few like her (I think it’s called tokenism) so the classism is less obvious.
The greater danger regarding the SCOTUS is that all the justices will have the same educational background and the attendent elitism. There should be room on the court for someone with an average American viewpoint.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:16 pm
Is that the ghost of Roman Hruska I hear talking?
May 27th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
Sorry ron, but we see the “average American viewpoint” all around us all the time, and it ain’t pretty.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:39 pm
ron,
What, was she the token “brilliant, hardworking valedictorian” in her class?
I can see what you’re saying about her being an Ivy Leaguer, and Ivy Leaguers often having the same outlook, but I’d argue that the Old Money Ivy League crew don’t gain their common outlook and background from having attended those schools. Rather, the opposite is true; people with that same outlook and background in common end up at the Ivies. They already have the same background and attendant elitism when they show up as freshmen.
Sotomayor doesn’t.
May 27th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
There are probably several thousand people just as qualified for every person that is accepted by Princeton.
Uh…really? Several thousand? Say they accept 2000 people a year. You’re claiming there are 5 million high school seniors just as qualified to get in?
I think the number you’re looking for is something like 3 to 5 times as many.
But Princeton accepts a few like her (I think it’s called tokenism) so the classism is less obvious.
Oh, I see. See, because she’s a minority who grew up poor, her getting into Princeton was tokenism. As in, she took the spot of someone more qualified because they didn’t want to have all white people, which they clearly would if they just took the best applicants.
Yeah, I think we can see right through that one. But keep rolling with it.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
The woman graduated summa cum laude from Princeton.
Well, that’s clearly going to get you preferential treatment for law school applications. Just as being a really smart kid will mean that you’ll get preferential treatment when it comes to getting a Princeton scholarship. For shame.
(Goldfarb went to Princeton as well. I suspect he’s got a chip on his shoulder.)
May 27th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
Adam-
Ok, I did the math and it is actually about 75:
3 million x 5% = 150,000
150,000/2000 = 75
assuming the top 5% of high school grads.
And it’s tokenism because, of the 150,000 qualified kids, Princeton took 2000, most of whom are from privileged backgrounds – but they added a few like Sotomayor (who is apparently highly qualified). If Princeton didn’t have legacies, “connections”, etc. – there would be more students like Sotomayor there, i.e., not just as tokens.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
when people discuss this type of “racia; preference” I am always reminded of chris rock’s line: ” I am rich and there still ain’t no white person in the room willing to trade places with me!”
I think that people from the national review et al need to raise their kids as minorities (make up and all)for a few years, take advantage of all the affirmative action they can find, and see how much of an advantage being non-white is in america.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:12 pm
I’m always reluctant to say someone’s a racist,
pretty ironic statement, coming from an employee of Marty Peretz.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
Princeton’s admit rate is around 10% these days, and I would be willing to bet it was considerably higher back in Sotomayor’s day (generally admissions slots have not kept up with applications at these schools, so admit rates have trended down overall). I find it perfectly plausible that Sotomayor was in the top whatever percent of their application pool for the year she was admitted.
Of course that isn’t to deny the potential for classism, but at least these days a lot of it is somewhat subtle, such as via things like standardized test scores or just general savvy about the admissions process. I’m actually not sure about in her time, however–that was a real transitional period for Ivy League admissions, and I am not sure exactly where Princeton stood at that point.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
GOLDFARB: And Jason, we both know she’s been the recipient of preferential treatment for most of her life.
JASON: How? Would you tell us?
GOLDFARB: No, Jason, I think we all know what we are talking about here.
JASON: At some points in her life she was picked over others simply because she was Latina? Can you give me a specific example?
GOLDFARB: I think we all know what we are talking about.
JASON: Say it.
GOLDFARB: I think we all know what we’re talking about, Jason.
JASON: Well, you say that she’s not qualified to be a Supreme Court Justice, and either way, we have the leave it at that.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
Ok, I did the math and it is actually about 75:
3 million x 5% = 150,000
150,000/2000 = 75
assuming the top 5% of high school grads.
This is off on so many levels.
The top 5% of high school graduates are not in any way suited for Princeton. That’s, what, 1450 SAT? (Scaled to the new system I guess) 3.8 GPA? That’s really not Ivy League material.
Also, you’re mistakenly assuming all of those kids would even want to go to Princeton or any Ivy League school. I had a 1590 and 4.0 and I wasn’t the least bit interested. Not only were they in an area of the country I didn’t really want to go to, but I was already focused on computers/engineering (and thus looking at places like MIT/CalTech), and my family, like many, were in that common middle-class income bracket where they can’t really afford to help but you make too much to get any need-based scholarships. Ivy Leagues, of course, don’t really give merit-based scholarships. So any college that was 40k a year was right out.
I would imagine a lot of kids fall into that category. If they don’t, why didn’t they all apply to Princeton? I highly doubt they get more than 10k applicants per year. Certainly nowhere remotely close to 150k.
So, in other words, of the let’s say 8-10k applicants they got, they took the best 2k, and a very smart, very hard-working girl from the Bronx was among them. Your reaction is to assume she was only picked because of affirmative action, not because she really was one of the best. And that’s just pathetic.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
ron,
Most of the top 5% of high-school graduates are not qualified to go to Princeton.
The Supreme Court doesn’t need an “average American viewpoint”, it needs the viewpoint of brilliant jurists, who are not, by definition, average.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:37 pm
One could treat this with finesse and say that Judge Sotomayor has benefitted from affirmative action, in that they would have been factors in decisions made regarding her, even although she would still have been in the same place absent that affirmative action beacause of what seem to be her obvious talents. But that’s almost certainly giving Goldfarb too much credit. (Would you be as generous with someone who excelled at a family business or at a legacy college?)
I do not have to agree with the progressive dogma the existence of which I am asserting that inquality does not exist when it is caused by unfairness to say that the joke with which you begin this post is a good one!
May 27th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
I should clarify and correct my most recent post:
“One could treat this with finesse and say that Judge Sotomayor has RECEIVED affirmative action, in that it would have been a factor in decisions made regarding her, even although she would still have been in the same place absent that affirmative action because of what seem to be her obvious talents.”
This, of course, is a bit of a stretch.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
Roman Hruska’s argument was poorly phrased, but it nonetheless has some merit. There are a lot of mediocre people in the country, almost by definition. And these people need and deserve more representation in our political process than they currently receive. Cognitive elites, even if some of their members derive from humble backgrounds, can be harsher and less empathetic to ordinary people than traditional elites. This is because the cognitive elites are more likely to believe that their position was achieved by merit. Over the past 30 years, our society has been run by cognitive elites, and the result is what Thomas Frank describes as a winner-take-all society. I believe that in many ways this is inferior to the postwar society in which mediocre people had greater representation in government, and that government therefore paid greater heed to the interests of normal Americans.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Stephen Hawking never woulda got no attention if it weren’t for him bein’ a cripple. I know’d it.
May 27th, 2009 at 1:47 pm
Adam-
You have my argument backwards. I’m saying Princeton takes only a few like Sotomayor but should take more – and fewer unqualified legacies and “connected”. And I’m pretty sure Princeton reserves spots for the connected.
Anthony-
Scalia is, by all accounts, a brilliant jurist. I would like to see fewer of his type on the court.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
ron,
Scalia’s reputation for brilliance is a bit unearned, but I’d still take him over “average Americans”. That really is a horrible idea. The Supreme Court isn’t affirmative action for the mediocre and regular.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Scalia is, by all accounts, a brilliant jurist. I would like to see fewer of his type on the court.
I’m too busy to dig them up, but there are plenty of accounts that call his supposed brilliance into question. But it’s really neither here nor there—I’d like to see a detailed argument on why you think average people should be on teh court?
May 27th, 2009 at 2:06 pm
Also, the antidote to Scalia would be a brilliant jurist who shares your view of the Constitution, not an average American.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
Josh @ 37 says it well.
There is a difference between cognitive ability and judgement.
For example, Richard Posner and Alan Greenspan are assuredly very bright, yet I would seriously question their outlook on life and their view of society.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:27 pm
Scalia is, by all accounts, a brilliant jurist.
Scalia is glib and provocative. His sense of humor, while never claimed to be “good”, appears to be “functional.” He is also outspoken. In him, this outspoken glibness is mistaken for brilliance. In a woman, it would likely be a sign of being overbearing and brash.
Not to say I wouldn’t like to have dinner with Scalia or that he’s not smart. His intellect is simply overrated.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:27 pm
The antidote to Scalia would be four bullets: one for each of the Federalists.
I mean, that’s the punchline: it doesn’t matter whom Obama picks, every SCOTUS decision will still be made by Kennedy alone.
I don’t want a liberal Scalia, I want Scalia off the god damn court.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:32 pm
There isn’t any evidence that Judge Sotomayor benefitted from affirmative action; she was clearly qualified to get in to Princeton at the time. But some of the comments here seem to say that if she HAD benefitted from AA, that might mean she is somehow ‘less’ than someone who did not. That idea is bullcrap. And here is how I came to that conclusion.
I’m a white male in my 50s. I grew up in an upper-middle class, very white suburb of Los Angeles, although my family was more blue-collar (Dad was a maintenance mechanic at a factory). A good student, not Valedictorian, but top 15% of my class. Good SAT scores. Completely naive about college, I applied to the local Cal State campus and, on a lark (because they had pretty architecture) to a highly selective private liberal arts college. I got into both, and went to the liberal arts college. It wasn’t until I got there that I realized what I had gotten into – it seemed like everyone else had gone to elite prep schools and came from the wealth and privilidge that implies.
I struggled at first, then hit my stride. I graduated (first in my family to do so) Magna Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa. I point out the honors not (just) to brag, but to make a point. I’ve had a successful career in higher education myself in the years since.
Years later, at a professional conference, I went to a talk on enrollment management by the Dean of Admissions at my alma mater. He spoke about a time back in the 70s when they were concerned about the student body becoming too preppy and homogenous, so they made a conscious effort to bring in kids from public high schools in the area as a balance, even if their credentials weren’t quite up to snuff.
I remember sitting there, nodding my head about what a good idea that was to get some cultural diversity as well as ethnic diversity, blah blah blah, and….HOLY CRAP!
I got into college because of affirmative action. What did that say about me and what I have accomplished in life? Not a damn thing. AA gets someone in the door; after that it’s up to them.
May 27th, 2009 at 2:35 pm
ron, the truth is that there are plenty of conventionally intelligent people with excellent academic backgrounds who also have good judgment.
The legal profession, however, seems much more given to reliance of academic pedigree when it comes to professional opportunities. It’s not to say that there isn’t anyone with the potential to be a brilliant legal mind without having attented a school we’ve heard of. It’s just that most of them have their career stalled much earlier in the pipeline… but good places to look for such people would be those who attended lesser-known law schools but nevertheless managed to get a SCOTUS clerkship.
Plus, given that Democratic judicial appointees are going to need a long track record of judicial experience to make them unassailable during the confirmation process (as Sotomayor is) means that there’s going to be a bias in favor of candidates who rose up the ranks young.
Honestly, I’d like to see more Attorneys General and law professors and former Governors and others end up on the SCOTUS, but Obama doesn’t have that flexibility, and no Democrat will until we are more established in what is finally accepted as a “Democratic era” of politics.
May 27th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
As I wrote this morning “If you’re a white guy looking to vent about how Puerto Rican women growing up poor in the Bronx get unfair advantages in life, the conservative movement has a lot to offer you.”
Don’t you remember all the conservatives who objected to all the unfair advantages that George W. Bush had in life (e.g., born to a rich family, prep school and Ivy League education, son of a President, grandson of a U.S. Senator, etc.)?
May 27th, 2009 at 5:46 pm
Josh G. @ 37: “Over the past 30 years, our society has been run by cognitive elites…”
That’s got to be the take-away line of the whole thread. How could I ever have thought otherwise?
May 27th, 2009 at 6:42 pm
Oh come off of it. Justice Thomas has the same goddamned resume and yet because he’s a supposed ingrate because he doesn’t support racial preferences. “Oh, he got his and now he wants to pull the ladder up. He benefitted his whole life from preferences and now won’t allow them for anyone else.” I’ve been assured for nearly 20 years now that these statements aren’t racist, couldn’t possibly be interpreted that way. So fuck you if you think that saying that it’s obvious that Sotomayor has benefitted from preferences is somehow racist. It’s just as fucking obvious that she’s benefitted as it is that Thomas has.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:10 pm
I got into college because of affirmative action. What did that say about me
The fact that the you can discuss the fact sanely says that you have more sense than Clarence Thomas does.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:30 pm
Oh come off of it. Justice Thomas has the same goddamned resume . . .
Thomas is not the least qualified pick in the history of the Supreme Court, and indeed was undoubtedly more qualified than Miers. However, he didn’t have as distinguished a resume as Sotomayor.
To review, Sotomayor was one of the top two students in her graduating class at Princeton and an editor of the Yale Law Journal. Thomas was a cum laude graduate of Holy Cross and graduated in the middle of his Yale Law class.
After law school, Sotomayor was an ADA in Manhattan for five years, then in private practice for seven years, specializing in international intellectual property litigation and making partner. She then was a District Court judge for six years, and finally a Circuit Court judge for over ten years.
After law school, Thomas was an Assistant Attorney General in Missouri for three years, then an in-house attorney with Monsanto for two years, then a legislative assistant to Senator Danforth for two years, then Assistant Secretary of Education for the Office of Civil Rights for one year, then Chairman of the EEOC for eight years. He then served on the Courts of Appeals for the DC Circuit about 15 months before being nominated for the Supreme Court.
I’m not one to insist on extensive judicial experience, but Thomas also didn’t have a particularly distinguished legal career, nor was he ever a prominent elected official. The one notable thing he did have going for him was his service as Chairman of the EEOC, but I don’t think that is a prominent enough Executive Branch position to really put him on a par with someone like Sotomayor, who actually has more total variety and depth of trial practice and judicial experience than anyone else currently on the Court at the time they were nominated.
May 27th, 2009 at 11:57 pm
DTM, Yale Law does not do class ranks, and hasn’t since the mid-60s. Thomas wasn’t ranked by Yale Law and Sotomayor wasn’t ranked by Yale Law. Thomas may believe that his academic record fell in the middle of the class, but there’s no way for anyone to know. (And Yale Law’s grades wouldn’t make it particularly easy to tell.) Service on the Yale Law Journal is not determined by class rank (because, again, Yale Law doesn’t do class rankings), and so serving on the law journal is not taken as a signal of merit as it is at some schools. In short, there’s no reason to view Sotomayor’s law school record as superior to Thomas’s.
For some reason you believe Sotomayor’s post-law-school record is more impressive. I just don’t see it. Making partner at a law firm of a dozen lawyers just doesn’t strike me as a meaningful signal of quality. Can you point to some significant litigation she led? Is there a memorable argument she made in private practice? Not that anyone can recall. Sotomayor does have more judicial experience, so there is one difference in her favor. She lacks experience in service in the federal executive branch and in the federal legislative branch, so there is one difference in his.
My point in any case is that just as one can be sure (or can’t be) that Thomas was the recipient of preferences, so too can we be sure (or not sure) that Sotomayor was. Since people in good standing on the left have said for years that Thomas got where he was in life solely due to racial preferences, surely there’s no controversy or racism involved in asserting the same about Sotomayor.
May 28th, 2009 at 12:48 am
Justice Thomas has the same goddamned resume
As DTM has so clearly pointed out to you, this is self-evidently false. His resume has all the markings of an undistinguished legal career. I am rather convinced that he’s not the dim bulb or Scalia-yes-man that he was made out to be.
However, Sotomayor seems to have the more distinguished background.
May 28th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
[...] And don’t forget that young women of Puerto Rican heritage are routinely given preferential treatment their whole life which is why so many Puerto Rican women are now the heads of multi-national conglomerates and sit on very many powerful boards of directors and the like. [via Yglesias] [...]