BARNES: I think you can make the case that she's one of those who has benefited from affirmative action over the years tremendously.
BENNETT: Yeah, well, maybe so. Did she get into Princeton on affirmative action, one wonders.BARNES: One wonders.
BENNETT: Summa Cum Laude, I don't think you get on affirmative action. I don't know what her major was, but Summa Cum Laude's a pretty big deal.
BARNES: I guess it is, but you know, there's some schools and maybe Princeton's not one of them, where if you don't get Summa Cum Laude then or some kind of Cum Laude, you then, you're a D+ student.
Soon, I'll stop being amazed. I promise.
The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood 
She was a History major. Fred Barnes, apparently was not.
Actually Fred Barnes was!
From Wikipedia The son of an Air Force officer, Barnes graduated from St. Stephens School in Alexandria in 1960. He spent two years in the U.S. Army and considered applying to West Point, but instead decided to attend the University of Virginia where he studied history. Barnes graduated from the University of Virginia and was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University.
Which makes his statement questioning the value of Judge Sotomayor's education not only stupid, but intellectually fraudulent as well. He knows better. So he's exposed as petulant and a liar.
Ugh, he went to my school. To study history (a top option at UVA) nonetheless.
My school too...why do we have to claim Barnes, Brit Hume and Laura Ingraham (though she's law school grad)? Ugh indeed.
Yes, you should have been Hokies, then you would not be aligned (in the smallest way) with these nuts.
Man, how come I couldn't go to one of those universities where you're Cum Laude if you're a D+ student. I would've had a fighting chance.
Word, Fred Barnes. The last I heard, all you need to graduate Summa Cum Laude from Princeton was a 5-0 record in Beer Pong. They give that shit out like candy. Candy!
Have there been any beer pong herpes outbreaks at Princeton recently?
Grade inflation is rampant in the Ivy League today, but I don't think that was the case when Sotomayor was an undergrad at Princeton. She may not be the next Learned Hand, but claiming she's not smart enough to be on the Supreme Court, when her background is as strong as it is, is a stupid tack.
Conservatives should listen to the Hammer on this (except for his bizarre and unfortunate reference to Latina "physiology"):
Can I just point out, AGAIN, that Sotomayor wasn't referring to herself. She was referring to a generic "wise Latina with the wealth of her experiences". She never said "I would be better than a white judge". But repeating something enough tends to make it become the truth to many people, even when it isn't.
If she is a "wise Latina" (we all agree on that, right?) and she has said that a generic "wise Latina" would have certain advantages, that's the same as saying that she would have those advantages. That's just basic logic, e.g.: all WLs are X; Sotomayor is a WL; therefore, Sotomayor is X.
No, thats basic making shit up that she didn't say. But nice try though.
If she is a "wise Latina" (we all agree on that, right?)
The point, Dave, is that her own wisdom is irrelevant in that formulation. In order for this silly argument to stick you need for it to be some sort of a statement about the general superiority of her own ethnicity but that is not what she is talking about. She is talking about the complex ways that one's background, anyone's background, including one's ethnicity, can effect their own wisdom and how they apply that wisdom. She could have just as easily said, a wise Latina or Asian or African American woman and then your "basic logic" wouldn't make any sense at all. Indeed, if you read the entire statement, its pretty clear that what she is saying is that whatever one might "hope" about the relevance of social and cultural diversity to wisdom with respect to cases concerning race and class, it is not such a simple equation.
It's pretty clear though, that the hypothetical wise Latina is meant to be a stand-in for herself and other Latina jurists and would-be jurists.
Again though, that's sort of beside the point. The problem with the formulation is not the supposition that a Latina heritage gives a jurist a unique insight, it's the hope and belief that that insight makes the Latina's judgment generally superior to that of a white male judge.
Why is it so difficult to understand the reason that, even in the greater context of the speech such a sentiment can be a bit troubling to some?
Pretty clear? Bullshit.
Her "wise Latina" statement bother me too. But I think it's just because it was a very poor word choice. I was watching countdown the other night and Olberman put up additional portions of the speech to provide context. The full context made it clear, in my opinion, that even if she was including herself in the "wise Latina" category that she was simply making a statement that ones identity and experiences are an inseparable part of them that affect the quality of their decisions one way or another and that a judge needs to be aware of that and take precautions against that were applicable. I'm pretty comfortable with this interpretation of her meaning and intent, but it makes the "wise Latina" statement even more baffling. Again, very poor word choice.
Is your distinction here designed to imply that she would not be so bold to call herself "wise"? Is it really your contention that she does not consider herself to be a wise Latina with a rich experience? Who cares that it's her?!? That's not the point at all.
The point is, whoever it is, she is making the assertion that on the basis of having an experience similar to the one Sotomayor has experienced, a Latina is better suited to being a judge than somebody who has an experience other than the one Sotomayor has experienced.
This could be a benign way of saying that I think my various experiences have made me a better judge than I otherwise would have been, but that's not what she said. What she said is, people with experiences like mine are better judges than people without experiences like mine.
AMT,
The poor word choice thing is basically where I've been from the beginning on this. And I agree with your larger interpretation of the purpose of the speech. But yes, as you say, given the context of what the speech seems to be about, doesn't that make the controversial bit all the more stupefying?
That, when combined with continued assertion that there wasn't anything wrong with the word choice, is just very grating for me.
The question about summa cum laude is a red herring. Even if EVERYONE graduate summa, someone must graduate at the top. And that someone was Sonia Sotomayor.
So even if grades were inflated, she remains the best of her class. If the best isn't good enough, then you're a racist.
First, while I agree with Karl Rove when he says he knows many people who went to Ivy League schools that are not so bright, winding up second in your class at Princeton even today, grade inflation and all, still would be an academic accomplishment signifying not so much intelligence, but intelligent effort.
The principled conservative (are there any these days? Seriously Dave, the whole second paragraph is ad hominem, not to mention an overly simplified understanding of the Ricci case with its attendant innuendo and her response to it--from a conservative perspective, where's the principle; ie, it's not up to judges to make law, but judge on the basis of the law. Insofar as identity politics goes--tell me truthfully, was there anyone Obama could have chosen that was not conservative that the right wing noise machine would not have trumped up bs about?). Read her decisions; Sotomayor is far more conservative than many liberals would like, and far fairer on issues of race and class than many white jurists. It is the singular lack of principle among conservatives that is marking their response to her nomination.
I agree, esp with your point regarding Judge Sotomayor's politics. She is not transparent on some issues. But does appear to be more conservative than other potential appointees.
She seems to have a judicial rather than political temperament. I disagree with some of her legal decisions, esp Ricci. But her decisions have been based in the law, not on her politics. Isn't this what conservatives requested?
Even so we have the rantings. Dishonest, unprincipled, and ultimately self-defeating.
You should read the whole column, CitizenE. Krauthammer believes (as do I) that Republicans should vote to confirm Sotomayor. He also doesn't consider her outside of the mainstream of the Democratic Party. Here's a little more from the column:
On her Ricci decision:
On how Republicans ought to highlight the contrast in views but still vote to confirm Sotomayor:
On the issue of empathy:
John Adams wrote: 'But how shall justice be done in human society? It can only be done by general laws. These can never comprehend or foresee all the circumstances attending every particular case; and, therefore, it has been necessary to introduce another principle or element, mercy. In strictness, perfect justice includes mercy, and perfect mercy includes justice."
Our whole sense of justice in the western tradition owes a debt to Solomon whose wisdom was tempered by empathy. A lack of empathy sees separate but equal as equal. Justice Roberts has plenty of "empathy" for corporate interests. The idea of the totally objective conservative judge, the umpire calling balls and strikes, the non activist judge, is one of the biggest bags of bull ever foisted upon the American populace. One man's impartiality is another's bias. There has been no more partial, biased, and activist judge in the last half century than Antonin Scalia.
If only Obama had nominated Cabranes... he's the one I actually wanted to see as the first Latino on the court. (He's also Puerto Rican and from the Bronx.) He's older by about 15 years, though, and there were concerns about having someone who would stay on the court for a good long time.
The search for young nominees is part of what gets us into these things. Nobody who is truly at the top of the legal pack gets considered, because they are all too old. So we end up arguing about what grades people had in college, which is silly.
Bennett and Barnes could not be more suspect. Its infuriating that this cabal of idiots get so much air-time and not dismissed as utterly mad.
And Dave, Sotomayor graduated at the top of her classes at Princeton and Yale. Next issue. Your grade inflation comment rings more like sour grapes. Get your kids in an Ivy first, then worry about their inflated marks not being an appropriate measure of their achievements later.
If you had read past the first comma in the first sentence of my comment, you might have written a less ignorant and spiteful response. Seek first to understand, then to be understood.
I am not the one that erected a strawman just to pontificate upon Judge Sotomayor's intelligence:
That was you Dave. I also checked your link to Krauthammer, who is about as dishonest as they come. Greenwald made this comment about the article you cite:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/05/29/anonymity/
Love the duplicity and false indignation. Still convinced about the sour grapes.
AND she was discussing this in a SPECIFIC case. I don't get it...It's pretty weak to throw out the context because it suits your argument, it's ridiculous. But then again, this whole meme is smothered in weak sauce, sprinkled with thuggery.
Yes. I would very much like conservatives to follow the advice if uber-hack Krauthammer on this and demonstrate their complete ignorance of the law by trying to hammer on all the "identity politics" issues at stake in the Ricci case. It will be amusing to see them get their asses handed to them by someone who actually has some knowledge about the law and about the specific questions involved in the case.
Correction: Krauthammer was just quoting Sotomayor when he mentioned the bit about "Latino physiology"; it was she who was speculating about inherent differences between ethnic groups.
Bennett and Barnes: They are who we thought they were!
Green's Rule always works, I'm telling you.
What rule is that? Googling "Green's Rule" returned nothing that seemed aplicable to me.
Dennis Green talking about the Chicago Bears. Classic sports analogy that has now lost some its luster because it had to be explained. ;(
That explains why I did not get it. It is about sports, a subject that I am willfully ignorant about.
I fail to understand why people are interested in who wins a game in which they are not participants.
Well, it's sort of the way you might prefer a specific cellist's rendition of a certain piece. You like that cellist's style, and you admire her ability to do something beautiful that well, and do it in a specific way that speaks to you.
Or sometimes it's because you like your home town, even if you don't live there anymore ;)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDAq5tyfk9E
Not quite a Jim Mora - style explosion, but still great for its truth quotient.
Thanks for the link. Looks like meaningless jock talk to me.
Shorter LarryGeater: I don't like something so I must insult everyone that likes that something.
I did not insult those who like sports. I merely said that I do not understand why they care. That is my failure to comprehend.
There are many things that I do not enjoy but can see why people do, Opera for example. I can even understand people who like to watch sports because they admire the abilities of the players. The one thing I do not understand is caring who wins.
Why care about anything at all then?
"The one thing I do not understand is caring who wins. "
You really aren't trying that hard to understand it then or care that much. Its not like there is around a million documentaries, movies, books, new articles about this. Google is your friend.
Sorry TNC off-topic.
Wisdom has its limits, but idiocy does not!
You'd stop being amazed if they stopped breaking the bar of stupidity. Every time I think they've reached a new low -- Tancredo & Gingrich with racism claims yesterday -- they limbo even lower.
Bennett tried, crediting her, though bliquely. Barnes, on the other hand, went to Harvard and knows better than to claim that Princeton summa is a birthright. What a fraud.
And beyond his crap, the suggestion of affirmative action is racist bullshit. She received academic scholarships because she earned them via excellence, and then whipped the ass of her fellow students at Princeton, graduating at the top of her class. How is that affirmative action?
Alright, I'm sorry to say this. I didn't think I would. But it's not funny anymore. Republican idiocy has jumped the shark. It's just frustrating to read at this point. No offense TNC, because this stuff is news, but maybe it shouldn't be news anymore.
I think we're reaching that point. It's tough to know the line...
My instinct is to say these people have no influence as to whether or not she is chosen so you shouldnt listen to their noise. The more difficult challenge is to know to what extent certain voices in the media are actually heard by the people responsible for confirming Sotomayor. I dont know if it was just a different time or the president being a Republican, but we have Clarence "who put this pube on my Coke can?" Thomas sitting on the Court and we're really discussing whether Sotomayor should be confirmed? Not to go on a rant, but I`m more shocked people aren't investigating whether she has a lesbian past, its kind of a good thing.
Notice that the discussion is more about her detractors than it is about Judge Sotomayor. Because thinking folks already know she will be affirmed to the Supremes. My guess is the vote will be about 72 to 25.
What is fascinating is that the Repubs are self-inflicting wounds on the practice range. This isn't even a battle. Brings to mind a friend who had a brain-damaged cat. If you stood in the center of the floor, the cat would circumnavigate your feet forever. Seems like the Repubs have little more brain power than a brain-damaged cat... they just can't help themselves.
But that's just the thing, it still HAS to be news because they keep going further and there are still people out there with their heads in the sand. The more they do this kind of shit and the more its highlighted the more people won't be able to just ignore the inherent racism and sexism in a portion of the GOP. A portion that just so happens to have big megaphones on talk radio and FoxNews.
Really? I mean, really? ~21% identify as Republicans currently. Obama's is at ~66% It's basically been guarenteed that Sotomayor will be confirmed.
Look, I think it's pretty obvious (now, anyway) that a group that largely thrives on the idea that white men can do whatever they want and that religion should keep women and gays, and once upon a time, blacks in their place is going to have some inherent problems. I also know that when people from this group speak people on both sides listen. Some people (again ~21%) derive some sort of sick community from it. Most people just love to be outraged.
I feel like the stupid stuff these idiots say isn't even really ever considered (which is fine, because it shouldn't be) before we get to talking about how awful some "far-right christian conservative wingnut" is for saying it. Ambinder did a good piece on that a while ago, it should still be on the politics channel. Fox News knows it draws a fair amount of liberal viewers who just want to be outraged, so why feed the trolls?
Maybe I'm being idealistic, but if I want to be challenged on my views (and I do), I'll goto McArdle and Sullivan. I know maybe everyone isn't as into politics and current events as I am, but maybe it's time to take the media in a more civilized direction. Newspapers are dying, so the argument that they need to write more populist articles and op-eds doesn't make sense to me.
Look at the NY Times, they are the poster child for this idea. Kristol was awful, but I'm sure he drew some readers. Though, clearly not enough to help them financially. So they brought in Ross, who is a much better writer. Still hasn't helped them financially, but at least they have someone they can be proud of.
If it's not news, people will forget.
Again, I'm not so sure about that. From a high-brow perspective, most people's politics are decided by who the president is when they are 18 and what effect he had. From a low-brow, don't political campaigns make it impossible to forget outrageous statements? (George Allen, anyone?)
Um, but if no one was there to point it out, it wouldn't have been news, would it?
It's a fair point to make; I'm not suggesting going completely hands-off with this stuff, but the extent which it dominates our news is detrimental.
Yeah, at what point do they turn into the libertarian party or the greens or something, where "Republican Expresses Crackpot Opinion!" no longer really qualifies as a headline? (No offense to the libertarians or the greens, but nobody really expects them to be mainstream). I'm starting to wonder if the term "Republican" is becoming so toxic that decent conservatives are going to have to start a new party called something else.
I would support a return of the Bull Moose party.
Yea, let's get some trustbusting going on. What ever happened to that?
The line is indeed hard to find. It's a dilemma - on one hand, don't feed the trolls. On the other, I fear that I'll walk away from this argument and return in a week to find that they've cemented a prevailing opinion. I wish I could find a way to make this obsessive energy productive - I enjoy posting here, and appreciate the collegiality, but I don't really think I'm having any effect on hearts and minds. I wish there was an actual battlefield, a place to debate where people who have been hit have the courtesy to fall down. The notion of objectivity has been destroyed, though, so I don't think anyone would trust any intellectual refs in a battleground of opinion. So we continue to all write our hearts out, hoping that it will mean something, that it will be useful somehow.
Meh. Long and short, ignoring it could be for the best. Or the worst. Fuck, I'll probably keep obsessing.
haha, I know what you mean. What's the Churchill quote, "Democracy is the worst form of government besides all of the others"? It certainly gets even worse when we have such a poor education system. Honestly, I blame that for a lot of the issues in media.
It's a tough call. Dave in Hackensack regularly registers a conservative point of view here, but I don't think of him as a troll, but someone who from a conservative point of view wants to engage the liberals who so widely post here. The problem with so many weak and propagandistic conservative memes, however, is that even thoughtful conservatives fall for them. That's why they must be called to task.
I think TN, however, is onto something that all thoughtful conservatives should become aware of: continued indulgence in tunnel vision, particularly tunnel vision that invokes classism, racism, and sexism, has its long term effects, not the least of which profound distrust.
Also, there is a pervasiveness of the right wing noise machine that I find nuts driving. Newt Gingrich was forced to resign as Speaker of the House of Representatives for ethics violations. He is famously misogynist in not only public commentary, but his personal behavior. Why should anyone take him seriously on issues concering prejudice? Because the media middle, bowing down to the lie of so called "fair and balanced," tolerates and even empowers fallacious perspectives, the need to react and lay things out in no uncertain terms, while exhausting, appears inevitable. The real question is what battles are worth the effort, and for that we need to keep counsel and temper each other.
My thoughts ran along a similar track to those of Bennett and Barnes. Was she admitted into Princeton with the help of Affirmative Action? What about Yale Law? Affirmative Action is a real, day-to-day policy of these schools, so it's not an unwarranted question. GW Bush himself was a beneficiary of preferential admission into Yale and Harvard Business School due to his legacy status at Yale and family prominence/fortune at Harvard. I was right to question the "merit" of his admission too.
I found out that she was Valedictorian of her high school in the Bronx. That she initially struggled academically at Princeton because her prep school educated peers were far ahead of her but that she dug in and worked her way to win the highest academic honor at Princeton, the Pyne Prize, and was also distinguished Summa Cum Laude. I learned that after she gained entry into Yale Law, she passed a rigorous two part examination process (5 hour "blue-book" exam; writing competition) to win a coveted editor position there.
It's just academic stuff and a person's quality is necessarily subjective and not easy to "grade" as we do in school. But it does tell you a few things: She excelled in every academic arena she found herself through law school, combining strong work ethic with an enormous intelligence to rise to the very top of two of the most competitive, elite educational institutions in the world.
No one gets into Yale Law without already being equipped to eat Fred Barnes as a small appetizer before lunch, and no one gets to edit the Yale Law Review without being transparently being one of the stars of the entire Barnes-eating class. No one.
Sotomayor also attended private school, Cardinal Spellman High School in the Bronx. True, it was an urban Catholic school and not Phillips Exeter, but there may be a risk of overstating Sotomayor's "up from poverty" story. "Up from fairly modest circumstances" should be good enough.
This may be the flip-side of lumping people who recently made it into the upper middle class together with people who are truly wealthy.
Affirmative Action is a real, day-to-day policy of these schools, so it's not an unwarranted question.
On the contrary, at the time Sotomayor applied to Princeton there was a restrictive quota on the number of women admitted. That was very early in Princeton's co-education, and the alumni and the Board of Trustees wanted to ensure that no woman would "take a man's place" by getting in. So male and female applicants were judged in separate pools, with as many men getting in as before co-education; women had to compete for the much, *much* smaller number of "women's spots" -- I think the male:female ratio for her class was no lower than 4:1.
Thank you. I didn't know about this history of how co-education came to be in Princeton. This is good knowledge.
The male:female ratio for her class is irrelevant.
A simple example illustrating why: if there were 4000 male and 1000 female slots, but 16,000 male applicants and 2000 female applicants, it's easier to get in as a woman. (This assumes both applicant pools are equal, which is just another confounding variable.)
Sorry, just had to point out the bad math/reasoning.
Y'know, the talking heads on the Right really are doing Obama's work for him, both on this particular issue and on drawing a sharp contrast between his administration's temperment and the GOP's. Well done, folks, well done!
One of the things that irritaes me about stupid people individualy is that they believe that you should fall for the same weak BS that they do. But it is a blessing if you are vying with them for public opinion. They spew the wewak sauce and are suprised when no one buys it.
The problem though, it that going up against people with weak arguments may make your argument more popular. It just doesn't make it right. Our goal should not be winning. It should be winning while also being right. An opposition that can be too easily dismissed is counterproductive to the goal of either side being right.
Yes, you're right about making sure the positions "we" support should translate into good policy and as well as popular positions. BUT, in this case, the President nominated a very qualified candidate for the Supreme Courty. So he's go it on the merits on this issue. The fact that he's managed to provoke his opposition into fits of crypto and/or overt racism (which, admittedly, isn't that hard to do these days) in public demonstrates why he's a great politician. A lot of people have a good command of policy but not politics. A lot of people have a good command of politics but not policy. President Obama has both, and that is he's so good.
I certainly agree with that. We need a good oposition to keep us honest. I am well to the left of the Democratic party but know that the failure of the right serves us poorly. The failure of their extreemists does not. I hope that the GOP recovers from its thrall to them or disintegrates and is replaced with a new viable party that is freed from these racists and fundamentalists.
I think Obama is a brilliant pol, but its not like he's had to come up with some super devious strategy with these guys. Its pretty much a given that every day, the sun rises, the sun sets, and somewhere there will be a Republican showing his ass in the media.
Totally agree. And thank you for using the phrase "showing his ass", one of my favorites.
Wait, why are we even talking about affirmative action in the first place? (Or am I just asking a stupid question?) Is there ANY indication at all that she wasn't simply the most qualified person, throughout her academic and professional career? I just read (from a commenter above) that she was the valedictorian of her high school. I know that she graduated top of her class at Princeton as well. Even taking the conservative anti-affirmative action discourse at face value, in what way does she come even close to being an example of affirmative action? (I mean, obviously, other than the fact that she is Latina. I.e. Wouldn't a white man not benefiting from "affirmative action" ostensibly get exactly the same benefits she has accrued based solely on "merit," understood, again, via conservative talking points?)
In fact, there was a LIMIT to the number of female applicants who got in at her law school. It's racism and sexism, pure and simple.
At Yale, Morey's is the historic, and historically exclusionary, eating club. In 1985, as part of the moot court finals, a male student scheduled the luncheon at Morey's. There were three sitting judges scheduled to preside, include Chief Judge Ellen Ash Peters of the Connecticut Supreme Court. One of the other moot court organizers asked the Judge how she felt about the Morey's meal, given that she wasn't allowed to eat there when she was at the Law School. Judge Peters answered, "When I was here, they didn't let us do moot court."
One COULD say that we're talking about affirmative action here because this is what affirmative action is supposed to do--identify the supremely talented members of minority communities who would have otherwise been overlooked, and let them do their thing, unencumbered by discrimination.
Now I get it. Being at the top of your class at an Ivy League university only counts if you're a white male. Thanks for clearing that up, Mr. Barnes. Just because white men don't get every job and appointment doesn't mean that the people getting them are unqualified becasue they aren't white men. Not a difficult concept, unless the fumes from the burning cross are interfering with the ability to reason coherently.
Excellent post.
And the media asks if we are in a post-racial society. I wonder where they get their mushrooms.
Remember, this is Bill "I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could ... abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down. That would be an impossible, ridiculous, and morally reprehensible thing to do, but your crime rate would go down" Bennett.
Still, he appears on The Daily Show to promote his book.
What's that about left wing media?
There is a certain segment of the population that will always resent those who, for whatever reason, achieve certain things that are traditionally seen as the domain of a privileged elite. Graduation from an Ivy League school is seen by many as a mark of privilege. Regardless of whether or not that privilege was earned by hard work and went to a deserving person there is a certain segment of the population that will always resent someone who graduates from a place like Princeton let alone Yale Law school. I think that the Republican party is unsuccessfully trying to tap into the resentment of hicks from de sticks for people with hah-vud accents.
In all seriousness I'm pretty sure that the battle of Sotomayor is just one more manifestation of a type of populism that is willfully disdainfull of people and things that appear to be overly intelectual.
Yeah, it was those populists on the Left like Rosen who questioned Sotomayor's intellectual bona fides. Because they are disdainful of "hah-vud" accents. Do you even believe that?
Populists on the right. Muckrakers if you prefer. People who seek to manipulate a segment of the population for their own political gain. Look at the current state of the republican party you can't tell me that they don't embody a type of anti-intellectual populism.
a populist doesn't always mean someone with liberal views.
Are you talking about Boston accents? Because Massachusetts natives who go to Harvard typically come from pricey prep schools in Concord and Andover where no one talks like that. If you want a good Boston accent (contradiction in terms maybe) just listen to Barney Frank.
sorry it was the first thing that came to mind. I meant the resentment of certain people for those who speak in what some would consider a more educated form of discourse.
Apologies I just thought the phrase
sounded good and made the point clearly I apologize.I still think the point stands that the argument over sotomayor is a way of tapping into resentment that is at its base extremely anti-intelectual.
"If you want a good Boston accent (contradiction in terms maybe)"...
Hey!!! Watch your Gawd-damn mouth!
Barney Frank went to Harvard.
You are quite correct in placing the brouhaha at Rosen's feet. The left widely called him on this, though he was one of their own. However, even Rosen comes off as a lightweight in "smear piece" (sorry Rikyrah) Sotomayor commentary to all the nonsense about Sotomayor hoping that someone who has felt the sting of prejudicial behavior might have greater wisdom in adjudicating cases where this issue arises than someone who has benefited from that behavior turning her into the equivalent of the KKK.
I think that the Republican party is unsuccessfully trying to tap into the resentment of hicks from de sticks for people with hah-vud accents.
Don't you think that refering to them as "hicks from de sticks" is among the reasons why such resentment exists? Also, this resentment hasn't always been just the domain of the right, in many ways, it propelled the most liberal President of the past 50 years, LBJ. He had a huge resentment of the Ivy's, the sneering East Coast elites, Kennedy's "Best and Brightest", and some think that it shaped his politics and ambition.
I was a hick from the sticks. I grew up po white trash not poor po p.o. So poor we couldn't even buy a vowel. I've eaten comodity beef, and government cheese in my opinion the penut butter is the best. The hicks from de sticks comment was a bit toungue in cheek. I suffer from it myself from time to time.
The resentment exists because people refer to them as hicks from the sticks you're right. You're right about LBJ too. I think this was a big reason why a certain segment of the population embraced Sarah Palin in the last election. The broader point is that I think the resentment of elites by poorer white folks has been co-opted by the republican party who use that class resentment to re-enforce an existing power structure.
I figured your use of it was tongue in cheek and I hope you didn't think I was calling you out. I was trying to make a larger point about how some of this resentment builds in people. Not only remarks about hicks, but the dismissal and ridicule of their faith. Of course, many who complain about those who ridicule their religion don't have an issue with taking shots at other religions. Probably human nature to be more tolerant to those who are similar to you and to save the intolerance for others.
(sorry Doug I have to reply to myself to reply to you)
That's the thing right, we don't exactly get to pick and choose which ideas or people we get to be tolerant of. It seems to me that prejudice is a product of ignorance, and the only way to combat prejudice is through experience.
I have heard some horrible things said about white trash people by upper middle class types without them even batting an eye. It's funny how prejudice works, and we all have our blind spots but the same people who wouldn't ever think of saying something that could be construed as sexist or racist or homophobic won't bat an eye about saying something negative about class.
I'm no expert but one of the things I've learned recently is that bigotry is a product of a person making broad genralizations about people that they don't understand. It's not the generalization per se, and it's not the lack of understanding so much as it is both together. One of my friends in the service his father was NOI. (Gotta love the military in my opinion it is the most egalitarian segment of American Life.) And he said that well meaning ignorant people could be more harmfull than ill-meaning bigoted people because they mean well but they don't understand.
Johnson by the way spent just as much time as a "conservative reactionary" as he did as a "liberal." Robert Caro's analysis of his career is absolutely brilliant.
Yeah, I read those books, they were great. I recently read The Liberal Hour which spent more time talking about Kennedy's conservatism and had more focus on LBJ's liberal phase.
Seriously, why do they hate us so much? What have we ever done?
We dared to question their infallibility.
They are who we thought they were.
And, they truly can't help themselves.
Thanks for this one, Coates. I'll help spread the word.
Hey, I went to Princeton! And I didn't fail!
It's been a few years, but surely my Cum Laude must be in the mail...
Many see it as a mark of white privilege. Let's call this what it is. If you're a poor white male and you make it to the top of your class at an Ivy League, or the top of the corporate ladder, noone, and I mean noone, ever questions whether your position was truly earned. (If someone has an example, I'd love to see it.)
Summa Cum Laude at Princeton = >3.7 GPA
Stuff it, Barnes.
"What she said is, people with experiences like mine are better judges than people without experiences like mine."
Breakerbaker,
No, what she said is she hopes that people with experiences like hers (which have included being the victim of gender and racial discrimination) would make a more just ruling under the law in regards to cases involving racial and/or gender discrimination than someone who is not likely to have experienced such discrimination (i.e. a white male). Nowhere does she actually say that she believes that a judge with her experience is automatically a better judge than one without her experience, particulary one who is a white male. She simply expects a justice who was a victim of discrimination to be more concerned about combatting discrimination than one who probably wasn't.
You know very well that in her speech she made referece to just decisions like Brown vs the Board of Education that were made by a wholly white male Supreme Court (although she notes that the plaintiff's lawyers where people of color like Thurgood Marshall). She also refers to unjust decisions that can be laid at the hands of prominent white male justices with overall good reputations, wise men like Oliver Wendall Holmes and Benjamin Cardozo. She also points out that the Supreme Court's record on fighting discrimination is very good, and that Supreme Court rulings against racial discrimination didn't occur until the 1950s, and that Supreme Court rulings against gender discrimination didn't occur until 1972.
Finally, she points out that while many white man are capable of attaining an understanding about racial and gender discrimination on their own, many are not. They need the benefit of a viewpoint presented by a peer who has personal insight into that issue, which is why Ms Sotomayor that having racial and gender diversity on the Supreme Court is important to ensuring that the Supreme Court doesn't issue the modern equivalent of a Plessy vs. Ferguson.
Knowing all of this context, how can an informed person actually make the argument in good faith that Sonia Sotomayor was saying that her experience as a Latina woman automatically makes her a better judge than a white male?
Indeed. Recall that it was Holmes in Buck v. Bell who sanctioned state-enforced eugenics with the pithy line "three generations of imbeciles is enough." As it turns out, Carrie Bell wasn't an "imbecile" -- she was just a poor girl who got knocked up by the son of a more "respectable" family which then used the powers of the state to cover up their son's offense. Empathy for people in that position probably never occurred to the kind of men who sat on the Court back then.
The devolution of Bill Bennett is a sad, yet illustrative tale: however annoying you may have found his earlier persona, you can almost exactly date his descent into wing-nuttery: when his gambling habits became public. What does America's self-designated scold do when he is found to be what Nicky in Casino called a "degenrate gambler" and didn't even lose the money playing real games of chance like poker, blackjack or craps, do? He embraces the bottom of the wingnut barrel. They'll take you in if you foam enough.
Do the Republicans really want to go the route of claiming cum laude Ivy degrees are worthless? I seem to remember a couple of Yale students - one of whom did so badly he flunked out, and the other didn't even make the honor roll - who achieved some measure of prominence in their party.
And OMG it gets even worse. G. Gordon Liddy On Sotomayor: ‘Let’s Hope That The Key Conferences Aren’t When She’s Menstruating’
I'm not making it up.
[a href="thinkprogress.org/2009/05/29/liddy-sotoyamor-menstruating/"]Link[/a] to that story.
Now both Cornyn and Hatch are trying to dial their brethren back. When Cornyn and Hatch are your voices of moderation--and explicitly disavowing, not just mouthing "well people can say what they like"--things are getting weird.
Remember all that "dog-whistle" talk during the election?
Well it seems clear to me that Obama knows how to draw out the racism out of the Republicans better than Palin!
"Summa Cum Laude at Princeton = >3.7 GPA"
Seriously, that low? I expect Summa to be much more exacting than that. What's cum laude, 3.0? Magna at 3.3?
Harvard Law School handed out latin honors to ~70%+ of its graduates until fairly recently. So Barnes may know of what he speaks--the question to ask him is: "what honors did *you* granduate with, or were you one of those D+ students?"