Race Carding Sotomayor

Is Sonia Sotomayor a racist?

To listen to Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich, and a huge chunk of the conservative punditry, you would have to assume that Barack Obama's first Supreme Court nominee fits that description.The chief evidence that Judge Sotomayor might have some interesting ideas in this regard are a speech she made at Berkeley in 2002 in which stated that a wise Latina woman would come up with better decisions than a white male and her presumptuous ruling on Ricci vs DeStefano, an egregious reverse discrimination case now before the Supreme Court where her decision will likely be reversed.

It’s worth noting that Judge Sotomayor's remarks at Berkeley were not an offhand comment or a response to a question but part of a prepared speech, and thus something she obviously thought about beforehand. It's also worth noting that it is the Obama Administration that has defended the judge's remarks as 'poorly phrased' and attempted to spin them, not Judge Sotomayor herself.

One can only imagine how long a white male Supreme Court nominee would last if he had a statement on the record that as a white male, he had better judgment and reasoning than some idiot Latina female 'because she hasn't lived that life.'

What Judge Sotomayor is doing merely mirrors her background. She's a creature of academia, like our president.

In the academic world, identity politics, quotas and groupthink in the name of diversity are acceptable as mainstream thought to the point where this kind of thinking is hardly even questioned anymore, and Judge Sotomayor is likely bewildered at what all the fuss is about.

There’s absolutely no question these ideas will color her judgments, with her ruling on Ricci Vs. DeStefano being a good example.

Does her acceptance of identity politics and group grievance make her a racist? Probably, even if an unconscious one. But it's pointless to attack her on the grounds that she is actually is one . Assaults based on attacking this sort of covert racism are sheer emotion and ultimately a failure. We have no means to monitor what’s in someone’s heart nor is it likely to play in the media if presented from the right side of the spectrum. That’s the sort of assault the Left is better able to get away with, and we saw examples of it in the confirmation hearings of Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Robert Bork.

Instead, it makes much more sense to actually explore her judicial philosophy with the right questions. How does she view the Second Amendment? How about First Amendment freedoms, or precedence of international law over US courts? What is her inherent view of the judicial branch of government and its role? Can she explain her statements about the inherent differences between groups, and what advantages her superior wisdom as a Latina grant her over a white male judge, and how that affects her judicial philosophy? What role does she feel that 'empathy' has in judicial proceedings, in view of the fact that the oath Sotomayor will swear if she becomes a Supreme Court justice says: "I do solemnly swear that I will administer justice without respect to persons, and do equal right to the poor and to the rich . . . . So help me God”?

Barring a major scandal, Sonia Sotomayor is going to be confirmed. But it is vital that her ideology be exposed, so that if the Democrats vote to confirm her, the nation at large understands that the Democrats and the Obama Administration now own that ideology and are endorsing it.

Buy the ticket, take the ride.

This is a rare moment for conservatives to publicly take the warped mirror of identity politics and judicial activism and hold it up plainly for the American people to see in all its inherent ugliness. Let them decide for themselves if that bigoted view really feels right for our beloved Republic.

We have here an opportunity that shouldn’t be squandered. As I seem to recall somebody saying, you never want to waste a good crisis.

(This fell through the cracks over at American Thinker, but I'd like to thank Larrey Anderson for his considerable help with it. He improved whatever merits it has immensely.)