Jul 14th, 2009 at 10:21 am
Thought of the Day
I would pay good money to hear Sonia Sotomayor say, “Senator Sessions, I think it’s ironic to be facing these questions from a man whose judicial nomination was rejected by this very committee on the grounds that he’s a huge racist.”
Update Seriously, though, when the Republican Senate Conference was meeting, did nobody say "if we're going to oppose the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice, maybe we shouldn't have a giant racist leading the charge?" This seems like a situation in which Mel Martinez might have been able to offer a useful perspective. Or they could have called up JC Watts out of retirement. What were they thinking?
58 Responses to “Thought of the Day”
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July 14th, 2009 at 10:29 am
I’d pay $20 for that one too.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:40 am
Sessions is the most odious human being. Ever.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:41 am
Silly Matt.
Being a racist has nothing to do with following the centuries-old patterns of behavior that marked white people as dominant and people of other races as subordinate during the period when this country was openly white-supremacist.
No, THE REAL RACISTS are the ones who believe that having experience as a member of a group subordinated by those patterns can provide useful insight into legal questions.
Duh!
July 14th, 2009 at 10:43 am
It’s hard to believe I ever thought the Republican party had mastered the direction in the political theater. I mean, an old white guy with a heavy southern drawl angrily interrogating a minority Supreme Court nominee?
July 14th, 2009 at 10:50 am
Sessions is no giant; he’s a little squirt racist.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:51 am
This the GOP — racism is a feature, not a bug.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:54 am
J.C. Watts was only a congressman. And if you look around, you’ll find that Sessions is only keeping the seat (ranking committee member) warm for Charles Grassley, who takes it over next year. The original ranking Republican, you will remember, was Arlen Specter.
The optics are indeed terrible, but it is probably one of those arcane seniority things. Though why Grassley didn’t just assume the seat immediately when Specter flipped is admittedly obscure (maybe Grassley has current commitments). But it probably did not reflect a conscious decision on the part of the entire Republican Senate caucus to have Jeff Sessions be the face of the opposition to Obama’s judicial nominees.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:55 am
The only part of the GOP that cares about the drama-free Sotomayor nomination is the racist wing of the party. It only makes sense that they should be kept happy by having one their own lead the charge.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:56 am
Marshall, I thought the same thing. That drawl sounds like something straight out of 1962. I’m getting my soundbites over the radio and Sessions seems like a really atrocious front man for the GOP — most especially in the service of a totally lost cause. Unless their strategy is to boil themselves down to a party of unreconstructed racists, it’s difficult to see a plan at work.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:00 am
I thought Lindsay Graham of South Carolinaacted in a bipartisanship manner, perhaps taking the lead from Obama, perhaps he’s always been like that, perhaps both.
He said what everyone knew instead of posturing, he said elections have consequences.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:16 am
Yes, but not for the reasons you think. The irony would be in seeing today’s racist rising, as yesterday’s sinks. Progress….
July 14th, 2009 at 11:19 am
a man whose judicial nomination was rejected by this very committee on the grounds that he’s a huge racist.”
Really? Never knew. *Checks Wikipedia* Huh, yup. I had heard about Sessions’ KKK remark and similar stuff, but not that he specifically had had a judicial nomination defeated because of that. Impressive.
What were they thinking?
If this were knowable I’d bet money that Mitch McConnell and John Kyl or whoever the relevant people are don’t want Sessions doing it, but Sessions personally wants to do it and the Republican Party has enough problems without frustrating its loyalists. What can they hold over his head, cutting the next pork project destined for Alabama? Finding a viable primary challenger even more right-wing than Sessions (good luck with that) and funding him? Shuffling him off to another committee, when Republicans are already outnumbered 12 to 7 on Judiciary?
If Sessions is the ranking member of the right committee and decides he would enjoy being on the other end of the table from a nominee, I don’t think there’s anything other Republicans can do about that. The Republican Party probably should have steered him away from the Judiciary Committee when he first joined it, but that would have been unusually prudent by anyone’s standards, let alone the modern Republican Party.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:32 am
J.C. Watts. Best option quarterback in NCAA history.
What’s old J.C. doing now? Preparing to make a run in ought twelve? Maybe he could pick Jeff Sessions as his running mate. What a ticket. A former Sooner great and a man who embodies the fine tradition of the Crimson Tide. They would wrap up the football crazy Deep South, that’s for sure.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:36 am
What’s old J.C. doing now? Preparing to make a run in ought twelve?
Did he ever make a play for the Senate? He certainly would have been an upgrade over either of the current occupants.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:37 am
I keep thinking the same thing, Matt. This is like having Rush Limbaugh attacking Walter Cronkite for his lack of journalistic integrity…
July 14th, 2009 at 11:39 am
They picked Sessions because of seniority. They would override seniority in a minute if they thought there was a realistic chance of stopping the nomination. Sessions can say things that more moderate-imaged Republicans won’t say. He can drive the racist wedge politics while improving his image at home and giving the other GOP senators a chance to take the high road.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:46 am
“Sessions seems like a really atrocious front man for the GOP — most especially in the service of a totally lost cause.”
Oh, I don’t know, seems like old white biggots from the South make something of a cottage industry out of lionizing those who fight in hopelessly immoral Lost Causes.
Who better?
July 14th, 2009 at 11:47 am
This whole sideshow is strictly to gin up fundraising from the racist base, and is another indication that nobody is in charge of the GOP. They have nothing to gain by this.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:47 am
Though why Grassley didn’t just assume the seat immediately when Specter flipped is admittedly obscure (maybe Grassley has current commitments).
Maybe as a non-lawyer, Grassley doesn’t want to be ranking dude on Judiciary.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:58 am
As Grassley appears to be asleep during some of the proceedings, I’m not sure he was the best man for the job…
July 14th, 2009 at 11:58 am
the Republican Party has enough problems without frustrating its loyalists
All 110 of them.
July 14th, 2009 at 12:08 pm
As I recall, this is the story:
After Specter flipped, Hatch was senior, but Hatch had also been term-limited. He decided not to seek a waiver.
Grassley was next, but he would have had to give up his Finance Committee position prematurely, and he didn’t want to do that.
Kyl was third, but he would have had to give up his leadership position, and he declined to do that.
So it devolved to Sessions, who worked out a deal with Grassley: Grassley will keep his Finance position until the next Congress, and then take over Judiciary, at which point Sessions will get Budget (replacing the retiring Gregg, and moving ahead of Grassley and Enzi, the latter of whom apparently didn’t want Budget).
July 14th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
After Specter flipped…..
And now Arlen is sitting next to Al Franken; and having more fun.
July 14th, 2009 at 12:59 pm
And now Arlen is sitting next to Al Franken; and having more fun.
Indeed. By the way, I thought his opening statement was in part implicitly saying, “Please note that I know ten times more about this stuff than my former colleague now running the show on the other side.”
July 14th, 2009 at 1:09 pm
This seems like a situation in which Mel Martinez might have been able to offer a useful perspective.
If Republicans were smart, they’d definitely have Mel up there. It’s a no brainer — he’s even an attorney by trade.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:10 pm
I’d give fifty bucks to see one of Sessions daughters drop Matt at some Dupont Square bar for calling her dad a racist. Then pour her Amstell on his head. Make that a hundred.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
Totally agree. I can imagine the uproar if a white man had said his “experience as a white man” gave him more wisdom and he should ‘rightly’ apply that to his legal decisions.
I use to poo poo the idea of minorities being a threat to the basic foundations of America but if Sotomayor is representative of them what we have here is not minorities who “want equal treatment” but want special privilages themselves and think there is some kind of “white privilage” they have to overthrow.
Who in the hell do they think created equality for them anyway? Not the countries they left because they were incapable of creating a representive government in their own countries. I guess their own failure in their own homelands qualifies them to show America the value of minority privilage..rotflmao
Equality is not enough evidently, we must let everyone take a turn at being “privilaged”.
Beam me up Scotty. What do we have do to get an impartial and unbiased court?…import an alien from another planet?
July 14th, 2009 at 1:17 pm
This seems like a situation in which Mel Martinez might have been able to offer a useful perspective.
Are you saying that a wise latino man would ask better questions then a white man? Sonia would be proud.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:43 pm
What do we have do to get an impartial and unbiased court?…import an alien from another planet?
Nominating yourself is tacky.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
Are you saying that a wise latino man would ask better questions then a white man?
When Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III is the white man in question, the answer is obvious.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:46 pm
I’m sure you do; I was writing in the voice of an idiot.
Uh huh. Sure you did.
Yes, clearly, you must have spent a great deal of time poo-pooing the idea that minorities are a threat to America.
This is who objects to Sonia Sotomayor, in case there was any doubt.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
I think he’s saying that even a mediocre latino man would as better questions than a racist old cracker like Sessions.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:51 pm
one of Sessions daughters
I’m disappointed to learn that neither of Sessions’ daughters is named Jefferson Beauregard Sessions IV. Tragedy.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:55 pm
Minorities ARE the basic foundation of America. But, like usual, the white guys are in charge, so they take all the credit.
The Pat Buchanan argument: the “they’re not sufficiently grateful” complaint.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
I was writing in the voice of an idiot.
Which you do quite frequently. Ohhh, snap.
Anyway, it’s quite racist to say that Martinez should be up there just because he is latino.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
Yet more proof conservatives don’t know what the word “racism” means, yet love to toss it around.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
Yet more proof conservatives don’t know what the word “racism” means, yet love to toss it around.
Yes, your definition is so much better; Anyone with an R behind their name.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:04 pm
It’s funny…someone writes that black people should be grateful to white people for giving them their freedom doesn’t register with “judd” at all. Nor does the assertion that minorities are a threat to America. Nor does the fact that a KKK-admirer is sitting in the United States Senate, head of his party’s Judiciary Committee members, holding forth on issues of race.
However, noting that a Latino can do a better of job of not looking like a racist jackass than an elderly cracker KKK-admirer – now THAT can’t be allowed to pass. Racist! Racist!!!!
Absurd.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
I’m sorry, I didn’t know I had to comment on every comment.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
More insight into the wingnut mind:
I have described one person as a racist: Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions. This is a man who was rejected for a federal judgeship by a Republican-controlled Judiciary Committee because he was such an appalling racist. Among the statements he admits making and defended are 1) calling a black attorney “boy,” 2) telling another black attorney that he “needs to watch how he talks to white people,” and 3) saying he liked the KKK until he learned its members smoked pot.
As a replacement for this degenerate bigot, I suggested…a Republican, Mel Martinez. A man with an R behind his name.
Once again, judd’s response: Yes, your definition is so much better; Anyone with an R behind their name.
Absurd.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
I have described one person as a racist
Oh please, you throw the racist label around almost as much as MY.
As a replacement for this degenerate bigot, I suggested…a Republican, Mel Martinez. A man with an R behind his name.
Yeah, and it has nothing to do with him being latino. OK.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:30 pm
I think that anyone reading the thread has enough information at this point to make their own judgment about how seriously to take an accusation from judd about “throwing around the racist label.”
I’ve never denied that it did. Here’s my statement: I think he’s saying that even a mediocre latino man would as better questions than a racist old cracker like Sessions.
The fact that Mel Martinez could manage not to be a racist asshat while questioning Sonia Sotomayor has a great deal to do with his Latino background. I don’t recall ever having suggested otherwise.
Oh, BTW, here’s your hero, handling the nominee’s race with precisely the delicacy and wisdom that makes any accusation that he’s a bad front man so wrongheaded.
I take it all back. That Jefferson Beauregard Sessions is exactly who Republicans should want out front. A thousand mea culpas. Palin/Session in 2012!
July 14th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
So Sessions is a racist for pointing out that Cabranes has latino ties and, by her own admission several times, a wise latino will come to “better” rulings, but you point out that:
The fact that Mel Martinez could manage not to be a racist asshat while questioning Sonia Sotomayor has a great deal to do with his Latino background.
Not much difference in my book.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:05 pm
I’m sorry, I didn’t know I had to comment on every comment.
Didn’t you though, Judd? Didn’t you really? How painful it must be to suffer through both OCD *and* denial.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
American:
Sotomayor is Puerto Rican. Puerto Rico is a territory of the United States. Therefor, her own homeland is the United States. Also, it’s privilege, not privilage.
Idiot.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:13 pm
[...] Matthew Iglesias puts into words the disgust I feel watching Jeff Sessions question Judge Sotomayor about her Puerto Rican ancestry: I would pay good money to hear Sonia Sotomayor say, “Senator Sessions, I think it’s ironic to be facing these questions from a man whose judicial nomination was rejected by this very committee on the grounds that he’s a huge racist.” [...]
July 14th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
noting that a Latino can do a better of job of not looking like a racist jackass than an elderly cracker KKK-admirer
Foul! Sessions isn’t that elderly. He and Martinez are the same age.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:34 pm
Isn’t it obvious what they’re doing? They’re doubling down on racism, looking to cement their stranglehold on a certain demographic (white, relatively little education, cultural conservative, with racist tendencies). It’s a big gamble, but maybe they think they can mobilize enough of those people and Obama will be unable to fix Bush and companies messes, which will translate into electoral rallying. At least, that’s the only thing that makes sense to me. They can’t really be stupid enough to believe that kissing the Latino vote good-bye for no reason is a viable strategy.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:43 pm
American (troll):
Beam me up Scotty. What do we have do to get an impartial and unbiased court?…import an alien from another planet?
Maybe we can get a time machine and bring Judge Taney back. I’m sure his views would be “impartial and unbiased” enough for you.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:44 pm
judd:
I know! You can’t tell the difference!
That’s what so funny.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
No kidding?
Maybe it’s just that Sessions comes across as something out of a previous geological age.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:54 pm
Yeah, exactly. Sessions comes across like he should be about Strom’s age. (Also, Martinez may be older than you think; both were b. 1946. I mostly meant “not that old by Senate standards.”)
July 14th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Maybe we can get a time machine and bring Judge Taney back.
Roger on that, but I dred the (un)intended consequences. Such as having a “wise Zombo-American” determine what a living document such as the Constitution really means.
[There's gotta be a way to work in "scott free" somewhere, but I'm having a brainfart.]
July 14th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
For the privilege of “calling a spade a spade” in the media – to use a phrase I’m sure the old man is familiar with – I’d let all of his daughters take a shot. They must be pretty big boned.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:16 pm
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July 14th, 2009 at 8:40 pm
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July 14th, 2009 at 11:40 pm
Joe from Lowell, what the hell are you talking about? Your first statement is the definition of being racist!
July 15th, 2009 at 9:26 am
Ryan,
I was writing in the voice of wingnut.
It’s always dangerous to try to parody those people, because it’s almost impossible to be sufficiently absurd that your words are recognizable as parody.