Revisiting the Judges of Yore With Republican Senators
Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) was disparaging Sonia Sotomayor’s “wise Latina” remarks and contrasted them with the words of Judge Miriam Cedarbaum who “believes that judges must transcend their personal sympathies and prejudices.” Sessions said “So I would just say to you, I believe in Judge Cedarbaum’s formulation.” Sotomayor herself said that she agrees with Cedarbaum and that Sessions is misinterpreting her. She also brought Judge Cedarbaum to the hearing. Leading to this great item by Jess Bravin:
“I don’t believe for a minute that there are any differences in our approach to judging, and her personal predilections have no affect on her approach to judging,” she told Washington Wire. “We’d both like to see more women on the courts,” she added.
Burn. Bravin adds:
In 1986, Cedarbaum and Sessions were both nominated to the federal bench by President Ronald Reagan, and were members of the same orientation class for future judges. Their paths then diverged, however. Cedarbaum was confirmed, but Sessions’s nomination floundered over a controversy surrounding comments he made involving the Ku Klux Klan and the NAACP.
The comments he made, to be clear, were about how the KKK, a violent white supremacist terrorist organization, was fine except for the fact that some of its members smoked pot. The NAACP, by contrast, was said to be a bad and Communistic organization.
Meanwhile, Kate Klonick notes the right’s strange habit of invoking Judge Richard Paez as a contrast to Sotomayor’s purported racism. It’s strange because Sessions and Richard Kyl, both of whom praised Paez to disparage Sotomayor, voted against Paez when they had the chance. Also:
Perhaps more amazing, Paez was no run of the mill nomination and confirmation. His nomination famously lasted a record 1,506 days when the confirmation was repeatedly delayed by Republicans who held the majority in Congress and cited his supposed “judicial activism.”
I still in an honest-to-God, no-joking way don’t understand why conservatives who want to vote “no” don’t just say something normal like “I thought Justice Souter voted the wrong way on a number of important cases, I think Judge Sotomayor is likely to vote in a similar way to Souter; I would prefer a judge who votes like Justice Roberts or Justice Scalia; therefore, I’ll vote no.” That’s not insane, it’s not offensive, it’s not foolish, it’s not bizarre—it’s something you’d have to respect.
100 Responses to “Revisiting the Judges of Yore With Republican Senators”
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July 14th, 2009 at 2:33 pm
Lol. Professor Sessions doubtlessly thinks Rodney Dangerfield completely misunderstood what Kurt Vonnegut was trying to say.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:38 pm
“I thought Justice Souter voted the wrong way on a number of important cases, I think Judge Sotomayor is likely to vote in a similar way to Souter; I would prefer a judge who votes like Justice Roberts or Justice Scalia; therefore, I’ll vote no.”
Many people in both parties believe, incorrectly, that it is illegitimate to vote down judges on ideology. As a result they have to search for other reasons to give their vote legitimacy. Being that the republican caucus, has widdled down to “the klan and the kooks,” they attack Sotomayor in ways that will appeal to their base.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
It’s Jon Kyl, no?
On Matt’s final point: I suspect it’s simply that being a Senator you’d respect — voting ‘no’ but accepting defeat in a dignified fashion — does not bring in the big-money campaign contributions the way a balls-to-the-wall obstruction effort does. After all, the big donors want results. Noble losers do them no good.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
I still in an honest-to-God, no-joking way don’t understand why conservatives who want to vote “no” don’t just say something normal like “I thought Justice Souter voted the wrong way on a number of important cases, I think Judge Sotomayor is likely to vote in a similar way to Souter; I would prefer a judge who votes like Justice Roberts or Justice Scalia; therefore, I’ll vote no.”
Measured, reasonable disagreement doesn’t stir up the base or raise much money. They call it Culture War after all, not Culture Difference of Opinion.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:45 pm
Obvious YouTube link.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:47 pm
if Senators could do that, the confirmation process wouldn’t take months and months. it’s all plate-passing and sideshow by people who run for office for a living.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:48 pm
Total burn. Sotomayor 1 Republicans 0.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:50 pm
Cedarbaum’d!!! I almost feel sorry for the Littlest Senator.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
To be fair, Republicans should say that they think Sotomayor would often come to the right answer, but because she’s not very smart and has character defects, she’d come to the wrong conclusion often enough that they can’t support her.
As for the “burn”–what? Really, since Sotomayor says she doesn’t believe her own words, are we supposed to be surprised that Cederbaum doesn’t take them seriously?
July 14th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
I agree with Matt’s final point. Chuck Schumer was basically saying the same thing during the Alito and Roberts nominations. He claimed he was trying to make it OK to vote up or down based on ideology. I wish he was being consistent this time – maybe that would build momentum towards a more rational process.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:56 pm
I don’t think it’s all about money. To an extent, they don’t want to concede that their point is a matter of opinion. It’s not sufficient for their adversaries to disagree, they have to be bad people too. The only way Jeff Sessions knows how to win an argument is for the person he’s arguing with to be a morally questionable.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:59 pm
I envy conservatives because, unlike progressives, they have Senators who understand how judicial fights work. Sotomayor is a shoe-in, of course, because of her long experience, and because she’s been through confirmation twice before. She knows how to play the game. Everyone knows this. And even if she is confirmed, she’s replacing a liberal Justice.
So, the Republicans had two options: to hold off any fight to “keep the powder dry” or to fight like hell in a likely losing cause. They chose the latter, and that’s a good thing because this fight isn’t about Sotomayor replacing Souter, its about a liberal justice replacing Kennedy, Scalia, Thomas, Alito or Roberts. By fighting this hard for a shoe-in, you make it more likely that Obama picks someone less liberal than he normally would for the seat that matters.
For instance, when Bush picked Roberts, everyone figured he was a shoe-in, and so the Democrats didn’t fight. That gave Bush the room necessary to pick whomever he wanted (Miers then Alito). If, however, the Democrats made Bush work for the confirmation, he would have been more reticent to select a crony (Miers) or a die-hard conservative (Alito).
July 14th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
I still in an honest-to-God, no-joking way don’t understand why conservatives who want to vote “no” don’t just say something normal like “I thought Justice Souter voted the wrong way on a number of important cases, I think Judge Sotomayor is likely to vote in a similar way to Souter; I would prefer a judge who votes like Justice Roberts or Justice Scalia; therefore, I’ll vote no.”
The point of the exercise isn’t to convey unhappiness about Sotomayor per se, to be on the record as voting against her, or anything like that. The GOP silliness has three goals.
1. Delay, as part of a hail mary pass — if something crazy happens or comes up that can make Sotomayor (or Obama) look bad, great. Otherwise, just doing due diligence, ya know.
2. Stir up some white male resentment against Mexicans (sorry … Puerto Ricans … I mean basically foreigners … what, Puerto Ricans are Americans? Well, you know what I mean … them) in the push to save real Americans from the scourge of the only kind of racism that’s left in American — reverse discrimination.
3. Reinforce conservative bona-fides for GOP senators on the committee.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
I still in an honest-to-God, no-joking way don’t understand why conservatives who want to vote “no” don’t just say something normal like “I thought Justice Souter voted the wrong way on a number of important cases, I think Judge Sotomayor is likely to vote in a similar way to Souter; I would prefer a judge who votes like Justice Roberts or Justice Scalia; therefore, I’ll vote no.” That’s not insane, it’s not offensive, it’s not foolish, it’s not bizarre—it’s something you’d have to respect
I think it is because Republicans do not agree with you that this would be a non-offensive rational for confirmation voting, or at least Republican rank and file do not. The general feeling, at least based on how we felt about no votes on Roberts and Alito that were based entirely on the criteria you list, were BS as the President has the right to nominate whoever he wants and as long as that person is competent and doesn’t have some disqualifying side issue the President should be given deference. This is why a Republican like me says “I don’t particularly like her, but I see no justification for a no vote,” and a Republican who wants to oppose her feels obligatied to find some seemingly pertenant issue to attack her with. I still find Obama’s no vote on Roberts to be utter crap, and I would find any Republican no votes on Sotamayor to be the same. This is clearly a case of differing philosophies in regards to confirmation’s between the left and right.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Republicans don’t give a straightforward reason for opposing her, because none of this is about Sotomayor and her confirmation. It is about reminding white voters that Democrats want to take away their guns and give their job to an unqualified brown person.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:05 pm
The reason why they can’t be as frank as MY desires is because both sides have agreed to the fiction that the law is above ideology.
Ostensibly, you’re just “calling balls and strikes,” and your political views have nothing to do with it. The right, in particular, is wedded to that notion (which is not to say that they are in practice any less ideological). The left may not be quite as wedded to the fiction of ideological neutrality, but a lot of senators are in the habit of saying they believe it — because it’s rhetorically easier.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
b1ff :
4. to stir-up the base for fundraising and recruitment.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
By fighting this hard for a shoe-in, you make it more likely that Obama picks someone less liberal than he normally would for the seat that matters.
I don’t think that’s true at all. For this observation to be valid, the GOP would have to be getting some net political advantage from attacking Sotomayor — but surely they’re not. I frankly was hoping — and am still hopeful — for a lot more naked racism from the likes of Sessions and Company. The good guys are going to need all the help they can get from an energized and pissed off Latino voter cohort next fall. My point is, if the net effect of attacking Sotomayor is politically beneficial to Democrats, Obama should only be emboldened to choose a good solid progressive next time around.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:13 pm
The reason why they can’t be as frank as MY desires is because both sides have agreed to the fiction that the law is above ideology.
Even though 39 states elect high court judges, seven of them with partisan elections. It’s curious that John Cornyn, having been elected to the Texas Supreme Court as a Republican, now advocates for the end of partisan elections in the state.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
Republicans should say that they think Sotomayor would often come to the right answer, but because she’s not very smart and has character defects, she’d come to the wrong conclusion often enough that they can’t support her.
Thomas, we agree. I think that, if Republicans were to honestly say that, it would be salutary.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
Republicans like to pretend that their positions are something loftier than they are–usually, because their positions are unpopular.
Hence, their opposition to integration wasn’t racist–it was an issue of states’ rights. Their opposition to the right to choose isn’t about denying women the right to be decision-makers, it’s about “activist” judging. Their opposition to healthcare is because “big government” is worse than people dying in pain. And so on and so forth.
Republicans tend to prefer these kinds of “bloodless” ideological arguments because too frequently they are on the side of policies that are more manifestly unjust in the real world. They’re supporting bad policies with bad outcomes. So, they need to change the subject to some kind of debating club issue like Presidential prerogatives, or states’ rights, or judicial “activism” or whatever.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
JD,
Yes, it is. I think the Republicans are completely wrong on this.
Lindsay Graham kept saying “Elections matter,” yesterday. Well, Congressional elections matter, too. The Senate is given a Constitutional confirmation role.
I think your position, while principled, comes down to the anti-republican (in the sense of royalist) Republican stance towards executive power. The President shouldn’t get to appoint whomever he wants to the Supreme Court, subject only to a minimal qualifications test. The Supreme Court isn’t supposed to be the President’s guys, like filling executive branch posts that require confirmation. THAT’S where the Senate should assume that the President can pick whomever he wants.
For judicial nominations, on the other hand, both the executive and legislative branches need to play a leading role in the process. Of course the President should have to nominate different judges if his party loses, or gains, the majority. Of course Senators should run on judicial confirmation. That’s an important part of what they do.
I liked, for example, the arrangement Clinton had with Orrin Hatch.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:41 pm
Or maybe, like we’ve been telling you for the past month and a half, you misunderstood her words.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
I dunno, if Republican Senators decided to be straight forward, then no one would be talking about nunchucks and I just won’t have a confirmation hearing if we are not going to talk about nunchucks
July 14th, 2009 at 4:00 pm
Actually, she and Cederbaum disagree on this point, which is something Sotomayor specifically said in those four paragraphs that you have to pretend don’t exist so you can pretend she said something racist.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:10 pm
This is how Sotomayor now describes those words….
“I was trying to play on her words. My play fell flat. It was bad,”
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/24909.html#ixzz0LGWKJ4qr&D
Newsflash: When a speaker employs words in a fashion that the speaker later describes as “bad”, then the listener cannot reasonably be said to have “misunderstood” the words. If person A fills the air with nonsense, then person B has not misunderstood anything when the nonsense is noted.
Sotomayor made some mildly bigoted nonsensical remarks. Nobody has a finely calibrated motive-o-meter with which to determine what sentiments she was truly trying to express, so, hey, for all anyone can tell, her current account of the motivation behind them is accurate. More importantly, there are 60 Democrats in the Senate, so it is all a sideshow.
She will likely suck at her new job, but there is no reason to think she will suck any more than anyone else, in that body nearly entirely comprised of unprincipled opportunists.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:18 pm
Nobody has a finely calibrated motive-o-meter with which to determine what sentiments she was truly trying to express, so, hey, for all anyone can tell, her current account of the motivation behind them is accurate.
Not true, everybody on this blog knew exactly what she meant.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
What an idiotic statement. The fact that Speaker A doesn’t make his point as well as he could have doesn’t make it impossible for Person B to understand that point.
I understood perfectly well what George Bush meant when he said he it’s hard to put food on your family. Nonetheless, his rhetorical flourish fell flat.
I suppose I could have pretended to think George Bush thought people piled foodstuffs on their relatives, and had trouble doing so, for political effect, but I’d feel like an idiot putting on such a pretense.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:20 pm
I’m not surprised to find that your news sources suck.
Her play on the famous comment has made it easy for dishonest people to lie about her meaning. This listener knew what she meant because I read the whole thing. You think it’s “bigoted” because you only read the clipped quote that was fed to you.
This is why you’re an idiot.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
Matt’s last point is dead on and is why the Democrats blew the Thomas confirmation so badly. They, more than the Republicans, had little to fear since the enactment of the Civil Rights statutes about race. So opposing Thomas because they did not like his philosophy (and everyone knew he had one even though they claimed he was a blank slate), was the way to go and could have save Thomas and Hill a lot of emotional pain.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
This is hilarious.
Sotomayor makes the statement. Everybody in the room understood what she was saying.
The speech comes up again when she’s nominated. Everyone except a cadre of movement conservatives understood exactly what she was saying, and explained it over and over. For months.
Sonia Sotomayor herself explains, with far more patience than I could have mustered, what she was saying. Again, this is exactly the same thing that everyone who heard the speech, and everyone except a cadre of movement conservatives, understood the very first time they heard it.
Movement conservatives’ response? Aha! She flip flopped!
Again, absurd – and I don’t mean that as a synonym for silly. I mean, this whole bit of political performance art is like a Dali painting. It inverts the viewer’s understanding of how the world works.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:29 pm
What is idiotic is to say that the using words in a “bad” way is synonymous with saying that one has not made one point as well as one could. Here’s another hint: The Gettysburg Address makes the point in about as well as words can be employed. That doesn’t mean that every speech which is not as effective as the Gettysburg Adress, thus meaning the speaker has not made his point as well as one could, is a “bad” speech.
The woman has said herself that her words were “bad”. Why don’t you respect her enough to take her at her word? Is it really so important to your sense of self worth or group solidarity to pretend that the people you agree with are flawless?
July 14th, 2009 at 4:30 pm
Let’s remember that she didn’t make her racist statement just once. She repeated her racism several times.
Once, perhaps she was misunderstood. But when she said it over and over, no, she meant what she said – she thinks Latina women are inherently better judges on account of race.
Classic racism.
But, of course, the Democrats are, in general, very racist – just look at how they love racist KKKer Senator Byrd. Voted him majority leader. Meanwhile, to the Democrats, Jeff Sessions makes a joke about the KKK, and he’s apparently the racist, even though the Democrats have an honest-to-God white sheet wearing KKKer as one of their leaders in the Senate. Not to mention a Vice President who makes racist remarks now and again.
So it is really no surprise that Obama picks a racist for the Supreme Court. The Democrats love racists.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:32 pm
Because, once again, she said more than that (fifteen times as much, according to your own quote, sad to say). We understood it. You didn’t. It’s the same problem you had with the original quote.
Your problem is that you’re just not very bright.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:32 pm
You’re right, she never made a racist statement, which counts as “not once.”
July 14th, 2009 at 4:36 pm
Yes, joe, Sotomayor says her use of language was “bad” because only movement conservatives took issue with them. Why, that noted movement conservative, Ta-nehisi Coates, had a post at the Atlantic in which he went on at length on how he had significant issues with what Sotomayor said! That proves it!
Do you have any grasp of how silly your argument is?
July 14th, 2009 at 4:40 pm
This is how Sotomayor finished:
But I knew that all along. I had read the famous sentence and the rest of the material as well, so I knew exactly what Sotomayor was saying. I also knew that candidate Ronald Reagan had offered the same justification for campaigning on putting a woman on SCOTUS, and that Thomas and Alito had said the same thing.
But that’s because I’m not as dumb as Will Allen.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:41 pm
Yes, JM, everyone who has issues with those words isn’t very bright. Like Sotomayor, apparently.
Look, I disagree with the woman politically, but I certainly don’t hold her in contempt as you do. Why do you despise her so?
July 14th, 2009 at 4:43 pm
You’ve generalized her objection to her own play on words to mean just “bad,” which is lying by omission, and taken it so far as to say I hold her in contempt, which is a strawman, so the statement is doubly false.
If that’s the best you can do, then I’m right about you.
Not that I’m surprised.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
You’d think it would occur to Will Allen to wonder why he can’t get anything right.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:46 pm
JM, look, you are a kool aid guzzler, thus it is imperative for you to act as if people you are favorably disposed to are flawless creatures who can’t be critisized for their rhetoric, and that anyone who does so is dumb. Understood.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:48 pm
Hello? Allen? Read the quote.
I gave the rush transcript to you, typos and all. I didn’t change a thing.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:50 pm
No, JM, I’ve simply noted that Sotomayor described her use of words as “bad”. This is true. You have stated that anyone who agrees with her is stupid. This is somewhat bizarre, but not altogether surprising.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:51 pm
Ah, that would explain why I can make arguments and you can’t.
Right.
She wasn’t ‘criticized for her rhetoric,’ she was accused of saying something she didn’t. And now you’re taking today’s statement and getting it wrong, too, which I have also demonstrated.
We understood it. You didn’t. This is why you’re inferior.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Lying by omission.
And Hitler had two legs, therefore he is me.
False. I’ve pointed out that you’re stupid because you can’t read plain English, nor can you reason at all.
How would you know? You’re retarded.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Yes, JM, when you guzzle enough kool aid, the meaning of words change.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:54 pm
It’s one thing to grasp as straws, like Sessions.
It’s quite another to not know what straw is, like Will Allen.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:55 pm
Yes, JM, anyone who notes the plain meaning of words is stupid.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:56 pm
Then knock it off. Problem solved.
At each juncture, I’ve demonstrated that I know more of what she said and that I had her meaning right from the beginning. I didn’t have to change anything.
You’re the one who has to clip quotes and prevaricate. This is because you’re weak.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
JM, I stated my support for her confirmation weeks ago. Unlike you, however, I don’t think it necessary to pretend that she is flawless, or to deny the meaning of words.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
Anyone who “notes the plain meaning of words,” only to show that they only noted a minority of those words, is stupid. I got the whole thing … months ago. You’re still struggling with clipped quotes (which I completed for you).
I guess the whole meaning would fit in your tiny attention span?
July 14th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
Ooooh! Will Allen has a new straw man.
I guess the old one was kicking his ass.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:00 pm
Yes, JM, Sotomayor characterized her rhetoric in the manner she did because anyone who doesn’t agree with you is stupid. Got it.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
And another straw man! What a coward!
You keep clipping quotes and I’ll keep completing them. You keep arguing with straw men and I’ll explain it to you. You keep pretending that you can argue and I’ll keep laughing at you.
Deal?
July 14th, 2009 at 5:05 pm
Hello?
Will Allen?
Where’s my bitch?
July 14th, 2009 at 5:05 pm
JM, you do not need to reach agreement with me about anything, prior to you laughing, giggling, talking to your invisible friend, howling at the moon, or anything else.
Happy to let you in on this.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:07 pm
Oh, golly, cliched prison lingo! How transgressive!
July 14th, 2009 at 5:08 pm
JM: don’t wrestle with the pig.
And Al? Whatever you bill by the hour, it’s too much. Even for pro bono.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
will you two crazy kids get a room already?
ahhhh… young love….
July 14th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
Al is a lawyer?
That’s just sad.
C’mon, Will Allen: make up something else no one said so that you can argue with it.
It’s not like you’re up for anything else.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
Hello?
July 14th, 2009 at 5:15 pm
Hello? Will Allen?
We’re all just dying to know what straw man you’ll hide behind next, which quote you’ll clip so you can lie about its meaning or which statement you’ll overgeneralize to mean anything you need to bitch about.
Watching you parade your sub-human mental abilities spares me a trip to the zoo.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:24 pm
JM,
Careful, better lay off the “sub-human” bit. Al is one 92-year-old Senator’s death away from elevating “anonymous blog commenter” to the status of “strongest evidence I can muster for the proposition that Democrats are, in general, very racist”.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:37 pm
Measured, reasonable disagreement doesn’t stir up the base or raise much money. They call it Culture War after all, not Culture Difference of Opinion.
I’m as puzzled as Matt is. Ideological disagreements wouldn’t have to be measured or reasonable. If you were a Republican, you could say, I oppose Sotomayor because I think she will vote against things like military tribunals, vote for things like habeas corpus, and basically leave America open to the ravages of Muslim hordes.
This would not be a reasonable, it would not be measured, it would get out a lot of money from your base, but it wouldn’t dwell on things like her race or ethnic background.
Plus it would be an improvement over the way confirmation hearings are currently done, in which each side instead of just saying things like that, focus on stupid shit like, Did she once say that Latina judges are wise. Blah blah blah.
So, I’m still wondering, as I guess Matt is, why the senators don’t just say that.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:38 pm
Al is one 92-year-old Senator’s death away from elevating “anonymous blog commenter” to the status of “strongest evidence I can muster for the proposition that Democrats are, in general, very racist”.
You missed the Vice President bit.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:48 pm
So, I’m still wondering, as I guess Matt is, why the senators don’t just say that.
Think bigger picture – the Republicans have an overt goal of controlling the conversation and the terms of the debate into very simple value-laden buzzwords.
There’s absolutely no reason why polls should show Americans to be almost evenly divided about Sotomayor – except that for many people, what they know of current events is little more than “Sotomayor defends against charges that she is a racist – News at 11″ rather than “Sotomayor discusses her judicial philosophy – News at 11″.
Drive this into the ground over a couple of months, and for most people, the only thing they know of Sotomayor is that people keep saying she is a racist. Goes a long way to instilling a cloud of question of character over Democrats and liberals (we know that Republicans will do anything to prevent an honest discussion of issues – keep the tone on “character”). Soon, people will start associating Obama with appointing racists to the courts – and the chinks start showing in the armor.
You’re an ill-educated white male with all sorts of economic greivances because all the blue-collar jobs have moved offshore. And Obama keeps appointing minorities who are racist toward whites. That’s all the framing that the Republicans want or need. Job well-done. News at 11.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:50 pm
But, of course, the Democrats are, in general, very racist – just look at how they love racist KKKer Senator Byrd. Voted him majority leader.
OK, this isn’t true, and pretending that there is no difference between Byrd and Sessions re: racism (or worse, pretending that Byrd is racist and Sessions isn’t) is just dishonest.
But let’s pretend it is true. How do you argue both that Democrats are the party of white racism (ie southern Democrats voted against the civil rights act before they all became Republicans, therefore Democrats are somehow the racist party, nto the party that adopted all the racists) *and* the party of “reverse racism” against whites. Seriously, you trolls keep pointing to the Democrats’ racist history–the history of an entire branch of the party that became Republican–as proof that we’re the “real racists” along with all your “la Raza = KKK” garbage. How could the first point possibly prove the second? Wouldn’t it contradict it? Can’t you make up any lies, smears and crazy logic that are at least internally consistent?
July 14th, 2009 at 5:56 pm
You missed the Vice President bit.
No I didn’t. I just ranked the persuasiveness of the evidence appropriately. In other words, I think “anonymous blog commenter” might actually serve you better.
Just curious: What was your #2 piece of evidence before Biden got named to the ticket? I know you’ve been beating this drum for a while, but I’ve forgotten how the riff used to go.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:57 pm
Can’t you make up any lies, smears and crazy logic that are at least internally consistent?
The question answers itself, I’m afraid.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:58 pm
FAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRTTTTTTTTTT!
July 14th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
Wow.
I haven’t an internet beatdown this bad in a long time.
I don’t think we’re going to be seeing Will Allen for a while. That was just ugly.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:10 pm
Robert Byrd renounced his rightist racial conservatism decades ago. Literally, before I was born, he apologized for the wrong he had done and started working to make amends.
Is it supposed to make me like Byrd less because he’s a convert to racial equality, rather than being someone born into it?
Frankly, the fact that the man had to overcome his background and culture to get to where he is makes me like him more.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:44 pm
Actually, joe, when somebody reduces themselves to “Where’s my bitch?”, I kinda’ respond like I would to a poor soul afflicted with schizophrenia.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:50 pm
Literally, before I was born, he apologized for the wrong he had done and started working to make amends.
Like using the n-word on national TV! Amends!
July 14th, 2009 at 6:52 pm
Oh, Will, you stopped making sensical arguments long before that.
The bit where you pretended that this statement – “I was trying to play on (O’Connor’s) words. My play fell flat. It was bad,” Sotomayor said. – isn’t a explanation that she didn’t make her point well, for example.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:53 pm
JM, Will Allen is only pretending to be stupid. You should have detected it by now.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:53 pm
Man, I wish the worst thing Ronald Reagan or Jeff Sessions did to black people was use the n-word on TV.
Nope. Don’t care. Am I supposed to?
July 14th, 2009 at 7:15 pm
Yeah, joe, people normally say the words…
“I was trying to play on (O’Connor’s) words. My play fell flat. It was bad,”….
when they think they have done a good job of conveying the ideas they intended to.
Lest I be accused of not posting complte testimony, here is Sotomayor…..
“I also, as I explained, was using a rhetorical flourish that fell flat. I knew that Justice O’Connor couldn’t have meant that if judges reached different conclusions — legal conclusions — that one of them wasn’t wise.
That couldn’t have been her meaning, because reasonable judges disagree on legal conclusions in some cases. So I was trying to play on her words. My play was — fell flat.
It was bad, because it left an impression that I believed that life experiences commanded a result in a case, but that’s clearly not what I do as a judge. It’s clearly not what I intended in the context of my broader speech, which was attempting to inspire young Hispanic, Latino students and lawyers to believe that their life experiences added value to the process.”
Here, Sotomayor is saying that because it is clear that the broader speech was an attempt to inspire young Hispanic, Latino students and lawyers to believe that their life experiences added value to the process, it is thus clear that her bad use of rhetoric which fell flat and left a incorrect impression was not what she meant. Or something. The woman is not gifted rhetorically, which, of course is not a disqualifier for the job. Also, it should be noted that she ignores another troublesome aspect of her speech, which is her ridiculous generalization of what “white” life experiences are.
Look, you have already plainly lied by asserting that only movement conservatives had issues with Sotomayor’s speech. For some strange reason, you have come to the conclusion that posting obvious falsehoods is a effective rhetorical technique. Please explain how you came to this belief.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:26 pm
You aren’t making any sense, Will.
I, and Sotomayor, and JM, have been saying that she didn’t express herself well. You seem to think that “she says she didn’t express herself well” is a rebuttal to this point. I’m not sure why, and I don’t think you know, either.
Good to see you finally admitting that you don’t understand what Sotomayor’s words are intended to convey. You’ve had this problem for months now, as you spent day after day telling us that the meaning of Sotomayor’s speech was obviously “I think Latinas are better than Whitey,” and it’s good to see you finally acknowledge the point I made above: Or maybe, like we’ve been telling you for the past month and a half, you misunderstood her words.
Admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery.
No, I plainly told the truth that only movement conservatives failed to understand what Sotomayor was saying. You seem to think that your demonstrating this to be true again and again somehow reflects poorly on me – but please, don’t take this as a request to explain yourself, because I really don’t care.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:31 pm
Sotomayor has confirmed that you were wrong, Will. All of that time you spent telling us that what she meant was “Latinos are better than white people,” you were wrong. As she said today, she didn’t mean that at all.
I knew this. Most people knew this. The people who attended the speech knew this.
You didn’t know this, Will. Unlike the rest of us, you couldn’t figure out what she meant. We tried to tell you, over and over, what she meant. You wouldn’t believe us. You continued to cling, like a laid-off Tennessean to his guns and religion, to an incorrect misinterpretation of her words.
Now that Sotomayor has cleared the matter up for you, confirmed that it was us, and not you, who properly understood what she was saying, it would probably be best for you to just breathe a sigh of relief that your paranoid delusion turned out, as we’ve been telling you all along, to be misplaced.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:50 pm
Man, I wish the worst thing Ronald Reagan or Jeff Sessions did to black people was use the n-word on TV.
Obviously Jeff Sessions did a much worse thing when he made a joke. About pot smoking!
Remember, to the Democracts, joking about pot smoking is much, much worse than being an actual member of the KKK.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:53 pm
Also, it appears that Sotomayor lied under oath today. She claimed under oath today the the “wise Latina” statement was somehow in agreement with Justice O’Connor, when the statement flatly disagreed with O’Connor.
But then again, Democrats don’t care about lying under oath.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:01 pm
Who is Richard Kyl? God, I hope they’re not paying you to blog because your knowledge of our current Senate is deplorable.
Good day, sir.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:13 pm
when he made a joke. About pot smoking!
Wow. That is astonishingly mendacious, even for Al.
Anyway, yeah, joking that you think the KKK is all right when you’re investigating a KKK murder is worse than using the phrase “white n—-r” on TV.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:27 pm
Sessions, like George Allen in Virginia, has a pattern of behavior.
Tell the truth, Al – you defended poor George Allen as a man wrongly accused of racism, didn’t you?
It wasn’t the part about the pot smoking that’s the problem; it’s the part about thinking the KKK was a ok.
Yes, it is much worse to have a senator who thinks that while he is serving as a senator than to have one that used to be a racist back in the olden days. People change; I wish Sessions would.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:37 pm
Wow. That is astonishingly mendacious, even for Al.
It is really something how the few Republicans we get over here who don’t shamelessly lie and distort are unabashed racists.
July 14th, 2009 at 9:15 pm
Whatever. Sotomayor will sail through confirmation. What Al and Will think is completely irrelevant and wouldn’t change if the truth revealed itself to them via a burning bush.
I am content knowing that when Kennedy retires shortly, Obama will be able to appoint another justice and restore a semblance of balance to the Supreme Court.
You know what I find fascinating? How the “racist” party wins the minority vote at every level (local, state, national) by large margins every single election cycle. How do you explain that? I look forward to an answer from our trolls.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:06 pm
That is astonishingly mendacious, even for Al.
Al has more or less admitted to playing a persona here. When people actually start politically following through on the sort of things Al espouses, he gets upset because he realizes that this hurts the Republican party’s political power.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:15 pm
Yes, joe, when a speaker fails to express herself well, it is the listener who has the problem. Got it. Look, I’m willing to concede that a Ivy league educated lawyer who has spent a long time on the bench, and is now rightly going to be confirmed to the highest court, is overwhelmingly likely to use fairly simple words to convey fairly simple ideas effectively, in a prepared speech. You, like JM, appear to hold her in such contempt that you argue that this is not the case. Very strange.
Instead of wasting a lot of time with more of your lying, why don’t you plainly write what Sotomayor would have said, if she was not the inarticulate bloviater you assert her to be. I will then quickly establish yet more of your dishonesty.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:20 pm
Uh, Singularity? I stated weeks ago that I think she should be confirmed. Strangely, some people think that if one correctly notes that she made a mildly bigoted nonsensical speech, it means one must be opposed to her confirmation.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:30 pm
Uh, Singularity? I stated weeks ago that I think she should be confirmed. Strangely, some people think that if one correctly notes that she made a mildly bigoted nonsensical speech, it means one must be opposed to her confirmation.
No, it means one has the comprehension and reasoning skills of a child.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Yeah, the Ivy League educated lawyer can’t clearly express a simple notion using simple words, according to some in this thread, and that means those who note the actual meaning of the words the lawyer used are children. Brilliant!
July 14th, 2009 at 11:17 pm
Yeah, the Ivy League educated lawyer can’t clearly express a simple notion using simple words, according to some in this thread, and that means those who note the actual meaning of the words the lawyer used are children. Brilliant!
Case in point.
July 15th, 2009 at 8:17 am
Will, we already know you got it WRONG. We no longer have to debate whether you got it WRONG when you tried to understand the point she was making; we know you did.
I don’t hold her in contempt, I hold you in contempt. It’s not a sign of contempt to say that someone expressed themselves in a less effective way than they might. Do you imagine Sotomayor holds herself in contempt? No, a sign of contempt is what JD and I have been doing to all thread – beating you like a renting mule over the fact that you don’t appear to be capable of discerning a meaning that just about everyone else in the country had no trouble understanding.
Why can’t you understand a simple sentence? Most other people could. Do you have such a poor grasp of your native language that the slightest ambiguity leaves you utterly incapable of discerning a thought? Or do you just pretend to be an imbecile because you imagine it to be a good idea from a political standpoint?
It’s fun watching you freak out as, yet again, the holy grail you thought you’d found turns to dust in your hands.
Yeah, the Ivy League educated lawyer can’t clearly express a simple notion using simple words, according to some in this thread… That would be those of us who, unlike you, had absolutely no trouble understanding that notion, right? What an odd thing to write – that the people who understand exactly what she was saying, and have spent the last couple of months mocking you for being unable to understand what she was saying, think she can’t express a thought.
….and that means those who note the actual meaning of the words the lawyer used are children You didn’t note the actual meaning of her words, you little child. Like a particularly slow, young child, still struggling with grammar, you completely failed to understand that meaning.
When you descend to this level of nonsense, Will, continuing to comment just advertises how bereft you are of legitimate arguments.
July 15th, 2009 at 8:55 am
If you disagree with how Sotomayor described her statement, you are showing her disrespect.
If you agree with how Sotomayor described her statement, you are showing her disrespect.
Dood, you’re flailin’ like Palin.
July 15th, 2009 at 11:04 am
[...] – Is it just me, or does Sen. Sessions (R-AL) keep grabbing at his [...]
July 15th, 2009 at 12:54 pm
joe, the fact that you have the reading skills, or deliberate dishonesty, of Patrick Leahy, does not mean that Sotomayor said what you assert she said, although, one can’t be sure, since you won’t actually say what you assert Sotomayor said.
Leahy, of course, is not as an effective a liar as you, so he simply deliberately misqouted her. You are a more subtle. Congratulations!
July 15th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
Fortunately, Will, we have the quote provided – twice! – upthread, so everyone reading your assertion down here that I’ve misrepresented it already knows you are wrong.
July 16th, 2009 at 12:23 am
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July 16th, 2009 at 3:35 am
[...] to have been decided by judge Sotomayor along minimalist lines. (Yglesias is to be credited for continuing to urge Republican senators to simply state “Judge Sotomayor made several decisions leading to results with which I [...]