board77

The Last Homely Site on the Web

Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection

Post Reply   Page 4 of 4  [ 73 posts ]
Jump to page « 1 2 3 4
Author Message
sauronsfinger
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Thu 28 May , 2009 1:12 pm
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 4336
Joined: Mon 28 Feb , 2005 9:28 pm
Location: The real world
 
The NY Times has a really detailed article with lots of behind the scenes information about how the Sotomayor pick was made.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/28/us/po ... ml?_r=1&hp" target="_blank

It should silence the critics from the Right who want to sell this as all about gender and race. It will not, of course.

_________________

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. - John Rogers


Top
Profile Quote
RELStuart
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Thu 28 May , 2009 2:35 pm
Legendury speller
Offline
 
Posts: 1208
Joined: Mon 14 Mar , 2005 2:06 pm
Location: US of A
 
sauronsfinger wrote:
The NY Times has a really detailed article with lots of behind the scenes information about how the Sotomayor pick was made.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/28/us/po ... ml?_r=1&hp" target="_blank" target="_blank

It should silence the critics from the Right who want to sell this as all about gender and race. It will not, of course.
I'm sure that somewhere out there are critics from both parties that feel this way. But the complaint I have is that the media is fueling this kind of feeling where it may exist by making race and gender their biggest headlines and while there has been good articles about past judicial decisions there seems to be more talk about how many hispanic voters this may woo in the coming election then the effect she may have over the next 40 years.

This is the tack that the media feels will sell their stories to the public. So I think rather than having a huge problem with just the left or the right what we are seeing is a reflection of a society wide issue here. Does the main fault lie with the public for creating demand for this type of reporting? Or is this merely the way the media has for the most part choosen to represent the issues?

Of course there is a numberous amount of people in my age bracket that pay very little attention to the news for this reason and because there is very little positive information conveyed by the media these days. It's a downer.

_________________

"When people don't believe in you, you have to believe in yourself. "
Pierce Brosnan

"Please don't disillusion me. I haven't had breakfast yet." Card


Top
Profile Quote
sauronsfinger
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Thu 28 May , 2009 5:40 pm
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 4336
Joined: Mon 28 Feb , 2005 9:28 pm
Location: The real world
 
Ed Rollins, former Political Director for the Reagan White House and Chairman of the Republican Congressional Committee has a very good essay about the Sotomayor nomination aimed at his fellow Republicans:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/05/28/ ... index.html" target="_blank

Much of what he has to say will be cheerfully ignored while it should be listened to and followed.

_________________

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. - John Rogers


Top
Profile Quote
RELStuart
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Thu 28 May , 2009 6:22 pm
Legendury speller
Offline
 
Posts: 1208
Joined: Mon 14 Mar , 2005 2:06 pm
Location: US of A
 
sauronsfinger wrote:
Ed Rollins, former Political Director for the Reagan White House and Chairman of the Republican Congressional Committee has a very good essay about the Sotomayor nomination aimed at his fellow Republicans:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/05/28/ ... index.html" target="_blank" target="_blank

Much of what he has to say will be cheerfully ignored while it should be listened to and followed.
Well said. :)

I'll have to post that on my FB.

_________________

"When people don't believe in you, you have to believe in yourself. "
Pierce Brosnan

"Please don't disillusion me. I haven't had breakfast yet." Card


Top
Profile Quote
sauronsfinger
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Fri 29 May , 2009 2:14 pm
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 4336
Joined: Mon 28 Feb , 2005 9:28 pm
Location: The real world
 
REL - glad it was helpful and you enjoyed it.

David Brooks of the NY TImes has a pretty good column today on the subject of emotion and judicial decision making

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/opinion/29brooks.html" target="_blank" target="_blank

He lays out a pretty good premise right at the start
Quote:
The American legal system is based on a useful falsehood. It’s based on the falsehood that this is a nation of laws, not men; that in rendering decisions, disembodied, objective judges are able to put aside emotion and unruly passion and issue opinions on the basis of pure reason.

Most people know this is untrue. In reality, decisions are made by imperfect minds in ambiguous circumstances. It is incoherent to say that a judge should base an opinion on reason and not emotion because emotions are an inherent part of decision-making. Emotions are the processes we use to assign value to different possibilities. Emotions move us toward things and ideas that produce pleasure and away from things and ideas that produce pain.
The entire column is well worth reading.

_________________

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. - John Rogers


Top
Profile Quote
Eruname
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Fri 29 May , 2009 10:59 pm
Islanded in a Stream of Stars
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 8748
Joined: Wed 27 Oct , 2004 6:24 pm
Location: UK
Contact: Website
 
sauronsfinger wrote:
Ed Rollins, former Political Director for the Reagan White House and Chairman of the Republican Congressional Committee has a very good essay about the Sotomayor nomination aimed at his fellow Republicans:

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/05/28/ ... index.html" target="_blank" target="_blank

Much of what he has to say will be cheerfully ignored while it should be listened to and followed.
That was a really excellent article sf. Thanks for linking to it. I especially liked this part:
Quote:
Let me state that I am sure Sotomayor and I don't agree on very much. And I am sure some of her liberal rulings will drive me nuts. But President Obama won, is a liberal and gets to put liberals on the court. That's the way it works. Ideology aside, is she qualified?

There can be no debate over her qualifications. Her lifetime achievements in the academic world, in the legal world and the judicial world are unchallengeable. If that was the only measure, she would be confirmed unanimously.
Whilst it's tough to swallow an opponent getting to nominate for the SCOTUS, that's really the way it should be.

_________________

Abandon this fleeting world
abandon yourself.
Then the moon and flowers
will guide you along the way.

-Ryokan

http://wanderingthroughmiddleearth.blogspot.com/


Top
Profile Quote
sauronsfinger
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Tue 02 Jun , 2009 10:37 am
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 4336
Joined: Mon 28 Feb , 2005 9:28 pm
Location: The real world
 
A study has been done of the decisions of Sonia Sotomayor to find out if race and ethnicity played a role in her dispensing of justice from the bench. The one word summary of findings: NO.

http://ninthjustice.nationaljournal.com ... r-bias.php" target="_blank" target="_blank

a portion of the larger article


Quote:
Has Sotomayor exhibited a pattern of favoritism to minorities in race-related cases during her more than 10 years on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit?

The answer is no, according to Tom Goldstein of Akin Gump's Washington office, a leading Supreme Court litigator. He has published on SCOTUSBlog, in two installments, the results of his own study of the 97 race-related cases Sotomayor has helped decide on the appeals court.

After summarizing statistics indicating that Sotomayor is not especially prone to rule for plaintiffs in discrimination cases and rarely disagrees with her 2nd Circuit colleagues in such cases, Goldstein concludes:

"Given that record, it seems absurd to say that Sotomayor allows race to infect her decisionmaking."
Like much of the previous information released about Judge Sonia Sotomayor, this should go far to shutting up the right wing critics who want to scream "race" about her nomination. Sadly, it probably will not since facts seldom get in their way or deter their agenda.

_________________

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. - John Rogers


Top
Profile Quote
sauronsfinger
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Wed 03 Jun , 2009 12:44 pm
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 4336
Joined: Mon 28 Feb , 2005 9:28 pm
Location: The real world
 
Interesting results from a new poll by the Gallup organization. It finds that a majority of people support the Sotomayor nomination and only 24% oppose it. That number is very close to many other surveys released over the past months which shows that between a fifth and a quarter of the public self identifies as a Republican. So basically the only people who are opposing the Sotomayor nomination appear to be hardcore Republicans.
Quote:
A new USA Today/Gallup poll finds Americans' initial support for Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor "similar to what Gallup initially found for past nominees who were confirmed by the Senate, including Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Samuel Alito. Americans were slightly more positive toward John Roberts' nomination."

For Sotomayor, 54% approve of her nomination, while 24% are not in favor of it and 19% have no opinion.

_________________

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. - John Rogers


Top
Profile Quote
Lidless
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Wed 03 Jun , 2009 6:31 pm
Als u het leven te ernstig neemt, mist u de betekenis.
Offline
 
Posts: 8261
Joined: Wed 27 Oct , 2004 8:21 pm
Location: London
 
sauronsfinger wrote:
Interesting results from a new poll by the Gallup organization. It finds that a majority of people support the Sotomayor nomination and only 24% oppose it...So basically the only people who are opposing the Sotomayor nomination appear to be hardcore Republicans.
Although I tend to agree with your sensibilities in the main, from someone who got a Masters from Cambridge, ostensibly for Mathematics, trust me when I say I would break the B77 server in capacity explaining why your assumption is completely wrong, other than you said "appears".

You have roughly a 50:50 chance of being right.

_________________

[ img ]


Top
Profile Quote
sauronsfinger
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Wed 03 Jun , 2009 9:21 pm
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 4336
Joined: Mon 28 Feb , 2005 9:28 pm
Location: The real world
 
Lidless - I defer to your mathematics degree. I do fully realize that from the different sets of data on both surveys that there is no way anyone could tell with complete accuracy that the two groups are the same... ie: the quarter of people who profess to be self identified Republicans are the same quarter of the people who oppose the Sotomayor nomination. As you noted, that is why I used the qualfier appeared. However, it would not suprise me in the least to find out when future more detailed surveys are done that the core opposition to Sotomayor is also the core support for the Repubolican Party. It makes too much practical sense to be a mere coincidence.

_________________

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. - John Rogers


Top
Profile Quote
sauronsfinger
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Thu 04 Jun , 2009 3:44 pm
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 4336
Joined: Mon 28 Feb , 2005 9:28 pm
Location: The real world
 
This is priceless. Manny Miranda, previously fired by Senator Bill Frist, went onto start something called The National Coalition to End Judicial Filibusters. Its aim was to demand a clear up or down vote on every Presidential nominee to the federal court system. Now, Mr. Miranda is heading up a group which seeks to filibuster the SC nomination of Sonia Sotomayor.

http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/w ... filibuster" target="_blank" target="_blank

If you wrote this stuff for a TV show or film it would be handed back to you with a memo that said it was not credible.

_________________

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs. - John Rogers


Top
Profile Quote
TheEllipticalDisillusion
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Thu 04 Jun , 2009 10:32 pm
Insolent Pup
User avatar
Offline
 
Posts: 5381
Joined: Wed 09 Mar , 2005 8:31 pm
Location: Many Places
 
Controversial people bring the hypocrits out like rats on a sinking ship.

_________________

The 11/3 Project


Top
Profile Quote
RELStuart
Post subject: Re: Souter retires - Sonia Sotomayor is selection
Posted: Tue 30 Jun , 2009 12:09 am
Legendury speller
Offline
 
Posts: 1208
Joined: Mon 14 Mar , 2005 2:06 pm
Location: US of A
 
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent ... bb83f.html

Not sure what the effect will be on Sotomayor but I am really glad the Court ruled this way. :)

_________________

"When people don't believe in you, you have to believe in yourself. "
Pierce Brosnan

"Please don't disillusion me. I haven't had breakfast yet." Card


Top
Profile Quote
Display: Sort by: Direction:
Post Reply   Page 4 of 4  [ 73 posts ]
Return to “The Symposium” | Jump to page « 1 2 3 4
Jump to: