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Republican Conundrum

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Anonymous

Guest
Sotomayor Pick Puts Republicans in a Bind

President Obama's choice of second circuit appellate judge Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court puts Senate Republicans in a bit of a pickle. On the one hand, she is of a moderate-to-liberal bent, having grown up in poverty in public housing in the Bronx and later graduating from Princeton (on a scholarship) and then Yale law school. So Republicans will instinctively oppose her, but of course they know if they manage to kill her nomination, Obama will nominate another moderate-to-liberal candidate, maybe even further to the left. When Sotomayor was nominated the appellate court in 1998, seven current Republican senators voted for her confirmation. These were senators Bennett, Cochran, Collins, Hatch, Judd, Lugar, and Snowe. It will be awkward, to say the least, for them to vote against her now unless they can find some decision she made as an appellate judge that they claim was completely inappropriate. Snowe has already complimented Obama on his choice of a woman. Her vote is thus already in the bag. This will give Collins the cover to vote for confirmation as well. So barring something unexpected, the Republicans have no realistic hope of actually scuttling Sotomayor's nomination.

On the other hand, the Latino community is likely to perceive the rise of a Puerto Rican from the Bronx to the Supreme Court with immense pride. If the Republicans even try to filibuster her, come the 2010 elections, if they try to expand their share of the Latino vote, this filibuster will come back to haunt them. It is bad enough that a young, telegenic, and very conservative Latino, Marco Rubio, is running for the Senate in Florida--with practically the entire Republican party supporting his primary opponent, Gov. Charlie Crist (R-FL). It will be a tough sell for the GOP to tell Latinos in 2010 (and 2012), "We love you, we just didn't happen to like the only Latino ever nominated to the Supreme Court or a very conservative Cuban-American running for the Senate. But when the right Latino comes along at the right moment, boy will we ever support him or her. Trust us."

During the confirmation hearings, Republicans on the judiciary committee will ask Sotomayor if she is a judicial activist and she will say absolutely not, she is just there to interpret the constitution and the output of all the wise people who serve in Congress and pass laws. But in reality, a lot of what the Supreme Court has to actually decide has little basis one way or another in the constitution. For example, does the fourth amendment's prohibition on unreasonable searches allow or prohibit a school to strip search a 13-year-old girl on the basis of a rumor that she may have prescription drugs hidden in her bra? The constitution does not say what is a reasonable search or an unreasonable search, but when this specific case came up, they had to fill in the blanks.

There is a fair chance the Republican strategy will be comb over Sotomayor's life and decisions very carefully looking for dirt and if any is found, use that as the reason for opposing her. But in the absence of dirt, and knowing that they don't have the votes to sustain a filibuster, they probably won't try. The political downside for 2010 and 2012 is too great.
 

hypocritexposer

Well-known member
I bet the Dem's are just itching for a Latino with "amazing life story."

Estrada, who was first nominated almost two years ago, is a 41-year-old Honduran immigrant who graduated from Harvard Law School, served in the Justice Department during the Clinton administration and practices law in Washington.

Democrats, who want more information about Estrada, have asked him to answer more questions and have urged the White House to release memos Estrada wrote while working for the Justice Department.
 

Mike

Well-known member
I see now. It's OK for the Dems to do some "Borking" and keep another Latino out of the courts, but it's not OK for the Republicans to reciprocate. :roll:
 
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Anonymous

Guest
The extreme right thinks shes too Liberal-- the extreme left thinks she's too conservative...Kind of sounds like she might be a perfect pick.. :D

But I do agree with the author--in all the articles I've read on her- her major fault in my opinion is being too friendly with business- which this court already leans toward....

Obama's Anti-Roberts
By E.J. Dionne Jr.
Thursday, May 28, 2009

Republicans would be foolish to fight the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court because she is the most conservative choice that President Obama could have made.

And even though they should support her confirmation, liberals would be foolish to embrace Sotomayor as one of their own because her record is clearly that of a moderate. It is highly unlikely that she will push the court to the left. Indeed, on many issues of concern to business, she is likely to make the Chamber of Commerce perfectly happy.

In this battle, it's important to separate Obama's reasons for choosing Sotomayor from her actual record. He was drawn to her not simply because the politics of naming the first Latina justice were irresistible, but also because he saw her as the precise opposite of Chief Justice John Roberts.

In his September 2005 speech explaining his vote against Roberts, Obama argued that 95 percent of court cases are easily settled on the basis of the law and precedent. But in "those 5 percent of hard cases," Obama said, the "legal process alone will not lead you to a rule of decision" and "the critical ingredient is supplied by what is in the judge's heart."

And that is where Obama found Roberts wanting. The young senator insisted that Roberts "far more often used his formidable skills on behalf of the strong in opposition to the weak" and "seemed to have consistently sided with those who were dismissive of efforts to eradicate the remnants of racial discrimination in our political process."


Obama believes Roberts's subsequent behavior on the court has justified his initial suspicions. He hopes that Sotomayor will be the anti-Roberts, a person whose experience growing up in the projects of the South Bronx will allow her to see life and the quest for justice in a way Roberts never will.

Conservatives -- particularly those who run direct-mail outfits and want a big court fight -- would love the decision over Sotomayor to hang on Obama's call for judges who show "empathy." They would cast her as a dangerous activist willing to bend the law to produce the results she wants.

They want to turn Obama's argument on its head and claim that Sotomayor would show bias in favor of those who share her background -- and never mind that they dismiss such assertions when they are raised with respect to white, conservative, male nominees.

The problem is that this approach is untrue to who Sotomayor has been and has little relationship to the decisions she has actually rendered as a judge. News accounts from the 1990s consistently described her as a "centrist" in her politics. Her lead sponsor when she was first named as a judge, the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, was hardly a conventional liberal. Obama may have found himself an empathetic judge, but she practices her empathy from the middle of the road.

A careful analysis of her record by Business Week, for example, concluded that she is a "moderate on business issues" and would fit the court's current alignment on such questions.

She also upheld a ban on federal funds going to family planning groups that provided abortions overseas. Sotomayor wrote that "the Supreme Court has made clear that the government is free to favor the anti-abortion position over the pro-choice position, and can do so with public funds."

Dan Gilgoff, on his excellent "God and Country" blog, points out that Sotomayor also ruled in favor of a group of Connecticut antiabortion protesters who asserted that police "used excessive force against them at a demonstration." He concludes that her "thin record on abortion is most likely a relief" to pro-life groups. In picking her, Obama sent another signal that he is serious about seeking common ground on abortion.

Liberals should not take the bait of the right-wingers by allowing the debate over Sotomayor to be premised on the idea that she is a bold ideological choice. She's not. But if conservatives succeed in painting this moderate as a radical, they will skew future arguments over the court. In fact, liberals should press Sotomayor on her more conservative decisions on business issues, an area in which the current court already tilts too far right.

As for Republican senators, they have to ask if it's worth alienating Latino voters to wage a fierce battle against a woman who is, from their point of view, the best nominee Obama was likely to give them.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/27/AR2009052702906.html?wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter&wpisrc=newsletter
 

kolanuraven

Well-known member
The Rep's will pitch a biatch about this...but she's gonna be confirmed.


They might as well throw the other oar into the water...as the Rep. party is O-V-E-R!!!
 

TexasBred

Well-known member
She will be confirmed, no doubts about it. But the republican party is not dead. All they ahve to do is do like the democrats. Tell the people what they WANT TO HEAR and then do as they dam well please.
 
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