Republicans Expand War Against Sotomayor To Latinos
What in the world are they doing? How exactly do Republicans think that expanding the fight against Sotomayor to include La Raza is a winning strategy?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZgtxwqGDiQ[/youtube]
(h/t Think Progress)
BTW, La Raza’s slogan is “Strengthening America by promoting the advancement of Latino families” not, as Tancredo says, “All for the race. Nothing for the rest.” NCLR has even published a document debunking the nonsense spewing from the right.
And the talk’s been building. Check out this compilation video from Media Matters and tell me how you’d feel if you were Latino. This fight has grown past a Supreme Court nominee, and now encompasses an entire race of people. On the bright side, one Republican, Senator John Cornyn, is speaking out against the attacks. He could use some help from the rest of his party… unless they’re happy kissing the Latino vote good-bye.
Seriously, are Republicans capable of anything other than the nuclear option?
Tags: Republicans, Sotomayor
Some wingnuts were going on about how Sotomayor’s name was pronounced. She’s in America (note to wingnuts: Puerto Rico is part of America) and she should pronounce her name more American. Some other wingnut was fixated on one of her speeches where she talked about what she eats, and how that would affect how she rules. They’ve just gone crazy, I guess they can’t help themselves.
Do they really want to call Sotomayor a racist, really?
Hispanic Chick Lady
LOL, go cry somewhere else Beck.
Glad to see Daniel Carver working again.
Besides that, have fun with that shrinking rabid base!
This is a great stratergy the RNC has . . . isolate the quickest growing minority in the United States. The GOP had Latinos in 2000 and 2004, and then the Lou Dobbs-induced mass hysteria about illegal immigration (or get some hate on for the brown skin folks) turned the Latinos to Obama.
Me thinks we’ve arrived at the point where the Democratic Party just has to sit back and enjoy the show.
“A top Senate Republican is taking aim at recent statements from conservative commentators Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich suggesting Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor is a “racist.”
“I think it’s terrible,” Sen. John Cornyn, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, told NPR’s “All Things Considered” Thursday. “This is not the kind of tone any of us want to set when it comes to performing our constitutional responsibilities of advise and consent.” (link)
FSP, when does Senator Cornyn apologize to Rush?
Last I checked, Cornyn wasn’t the person Republicans were kissing up to.
“Courtesy of New Majority, here is Biden on Justice Thomas:
“I think that the only reason Clarence Thomas is on the Court is because he is black. I don’t believe he could have won had he been white. And the reason is, I think it was a cynical ploy by President Bush.”
Surely Sotomayor’s status as a Latino and a Women had nothing to do with her pick? Right? Right?”
HYP-O-CRITS ABOUND!!!!
Turns out most Americans support Obama’s pick.
Hmm… If memory serves me correctly, Tancredo ran into some problems when a contractor he hired to remodel his home in suburban Denver used undocumented workers. Of course, he said he had no idea they were illegals. Seems to be a running theme for the GOP – they have no mind.
Rush Limbaugh? Private citizen. Newt Gingrich? Private Citizen. Tom Tancredo? Private citizen. And all profit in some way from attention.
John Cornyn? Actual US Senator & chosen party leader.
Well your privates are GOING KRAZZIE!@!
LOLOLOL!
And I did link to Cornyn’s statement in the post. See how fair and balanced I am!
Pandora is fair. It balances out the rest of you. Fair and balanced.
Oh. My. God.
Fuck these people and their followers….lowest of the low. Can’t wait until they all fucking die out.
They’re all pathetic attention whores of varying degree. The GOP rebukes should be swift and forceful.
Hopefully.
But you know they speak to and for the group….
They’re all pathetic attention whores of varying degree. The GOP rebukes should be swift and forceful.
Afterwards, the GOP apologies will be swift and tepid when they grovel at the feet of the Almighty Rush.
“But you know they speak to and for the group”
No, they don’t. They entertain for money.
Still no rebukes from the RNC.
This feels awful. Because my feeling after reading what Sotomayor said is that she needs to apologize for what she said. And feeling that way by definition aligns me with creeps like Limbaugh and Hannity, even though I am far, far from a conservative.
What to do, what to do….
I think the rebukes should continue to come from the Republican Senate, so that the American people know that the Republicans who actually have a say in the matter are focused on the right things: questionable statements, a thin history on many legal issues, and overturned opinions.
It’s called The Daily Affirmation, Dave.
No excuse.
I will say that I know a few people who listen to the AM hate mongers just for fun, but they are few and far between the tape recorders who use what they heard on the radio to support and reinforce their views, regardless of facts.
I laugh at them.
Rich,
Quit listening to their out-of-context selective quoting of Sotomayor. She’s actually saying the opposite of what they’re implying. She’s is saying that you can’t divorce yourself completely from your experience but you try your best to be fair. That’s not a controversial statement at all. The double standards are sure thick, though. When Alito talked about his immigrants roots, it was a great thing.
More:
“In what seemed like an effort to distance the party from claims that Sotomayor is “racist” and an “Affirmative Action” pick, Steele repeatedly said that Republicans should be hailing the historic nature of Obama’s pick.
“I’m excited that a Hispanic woman is in this position,” Steele said. He added that instead of “slammin’ and rammin’” on Sotomayor, Republicans should “acknowledge” the “historic aspect” of the pick and make a “cogent, articulate argument” against her for purely substantive reasons.
Steele warned that because of the attacks, “we get painted as a party that’s against the first Hispanic woman” picked for the Supreme Court.
“We don’t need to play this the way the Democrats have played it in the past,” Steele said, adding that Republicans can’t do this because they don’t have the “liberal media” on their side, the way Dems did. Said Steele: “MSNBC will rip everything we have to say up into shreds.”
Heh – liberal media.
Saying it over and over again doesn’t make it so.
You’re missing the point. All of the party and elected officials are saying the right things and the attention whores are getting the publicity, because “judge her on her merits” doesn’t sell papers.
This is the quote from Sotomayor, which I found on Politco.Com (I’ve no idea what political bent politco.com has, but anyhow):
““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.”
I’m trying, really really hard, but I just cannot imagine a context in which this statement does NOT imply/suggest that a “Latina woman” would provide “better” legal conclusions than a “white male”.
I think one of the key elements of Sotomayor’s remark is the “….a white male who hasn’t lived that life…”. Sotomayor’s phrasing here seems to be implying that everywhere and in every instance, a “Latina woman” will always have had it harder than a “white male” and that, therefore, somehow, the hypothetical “Latina woman” will be more “attuned” to the spirits of truth and justice. I simply don’t buy that, and I think such a mentality goes about four paces past naivete and right into actual prejudice.
Which is a shame.
No, I get the point.
Strawmen and plausible deniability….that’s the point.
Get others to do the dirty work so their hands are clean!
So you can have the rubes, like Art Downs, spread the “news” to those who don’t live off the AM dial, but have Cornyn play the role of mainstream.
Because your base has been convinced that the attention whores speak for them — not the party and elected officials.
And neither the party or the elected officials are doing much to disabuse them of that notion, either.
Read this Rich:
http://mediamatters.org/research/200905270005
Politico is like People Mag for politics -mostly crap with a few good nuggets.
Von –
I read the article. And the full context of Sotomayor’s statement. But it’s not helping.
Firstly, she (Sotomayor) does herself no favors by saying that she does not agree that “…a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases…”. I take her opinion of Justice O’Connor’s statement to mean that she has her own gender politics axes to grind.
Secondly, she then tries to defend her politics by quoting a professor named Martha Minnow: “…there can never be a universal definition of wise…” Oh, really? I find that notion somewhat troubling. So, she’s 0 for 0 as far as a defense of her politics goes, to me.
And, again, let me point once more to the “..a white male [every white male, apparently] who hasn’t lived that life [every Latina woman’s, presumably].”
There are assumptions, important, telling assumptions that we just can’t look away from, in Sotomayor’s phrasing here.
I very much agree with this statement, especially after the recent absurd decision and rationale in the Ledbetter case. Otherwise you’d have to argue that a person who has experienced discrimination cannot identify the act, and bring a better remedy, more often than a person who has never had such experience.
I think it’s a reasonable assumption. For those who care, here’s the statement:
” In our private conversations, Judge [Miriam] Cedarbaum has pointed out to me that seminal decisions in race and sex discrimination cases have come from Supreme Courts composed exclusively of white males. I agree that this is significant but I also choose to emphasize that the people who argued those cases before the Supreme Court which changed the legal landscape ultimately were largely people of color and women. I recall that Justice Thurgood Marshall, Judge Connie Baker Motley, the first black woman appointed to the federal bench, and others of the NAACP argued Brown v. Board of Education. Similarly, Justice [Ruth Bader] Ginsburg, with other women attorneys, was instrumental in advocating and convincing the Court that equality of work required equality in terms and conditions of employment.
Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences, a possibility I abhor less or discount less than my colleague Judge Cedarbaum, our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging. Justice [Sandra Day] O’Connor has often been cited as saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am not so sure Justice O’Connor is the author of that line since Professor Resnik attributes that line to Supreme Court Justice Coyle. I am also not so sure that I agree with the statement. First, as Professor Martha Minnow has noted, there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, 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.
Let us not forget that wise men like Oliver Wendell Holmes and Justice [Benjamin] Cardozo voted on cases which upheld both sex and race discrimination in our society. Until 1972, no Supreme Court case ever upheld the claim of a woman in a gender discrimination case. I, like Professor Carter, believe that we should not be so myopic as to believe that others of different experiences or backgrounds are incapable of understanding the values and needs of people from a different group. Many are so capable. As Judge Cedarbaum pointed out to me, nine white men on the Supreme Court in the past have done so on many occasions and on many issues including Brown.
However, to understand takes time and effort, something that not all people are willing to give. For others, their experiences limit their ability to understand the experiences of others. Other simply do not care. Hence, one must accept the proposition that a difference there will be by the presence of women and people of color on the bench. Personal experiences affect the facts that judges choose to see.”