This is almost better than the gay chick.
i know, right? the "generalized disapproval" of "Mexicans" -- read: Mexicans, Central Americans, Puerto Ricans, Cubans, etc. -- is far more widespread and is actually a greater source of racist panic in this country than is the fear of homosexual recruitment by powerful lesbians and sneaky, stealthy gay priests and teachers and boy scout leaders.
it's astonishing to me how her nomination is now just about race. or at least it is about the NOT RACIST conservative white males.
as if it never occurred to anyone that Bush may well have selected his SCOTUS nominees on the basis of race and gender.
and people wonder why people of color tend to laugh at the concept of a "colorblind" society. the only people who are never judged on their color tend to be white people, and tend to be white males as well. no one questions your qualifications as a white male, but if there's, say, an eminently qualified Puerto Rican woman who went to Princeton (and graduated summa cum laude) and then Yale Law and is as qualified as absolutely anyone else, THEN we say, "she was picked because she was a woman! because she's a puerto rican! obviously!"
does it not occur to these critics that most of the elderly white male heterosexual protestants have received preferential treatment far more ingrained and institutionalized than whatever Ms. Sotomayor may or may not have achieved? do we really think that GWB would have gotten into Yale and Harvard had he not been surname Bush? if he had been a poor Puerto Rican girl born in the projects in the Bronx, would he have wound up president any way?
it actually really pisses me off. and how there's been affirmative action for most of the people in power in this country. i went to a prestigious liberal arts college that accepts fewer than 20% of it's applicants. a good friend of mine was a legacy. he was smart, good grades and scores and all that, but what lifted him in was the legacy. his father, who's in his 60s, who's precisely the same age as, say, Sen. Sessions or Gingrich, didn't even have to formally apply when he was an undergrad. the principal of his private high school simply called the Dean of Admissions and said, "i've got a kid who would make a good fit." and boom, done. he was accepted. and let's not forget the fact that many of these schools were all-male until the late 1960s or even 1970s. this is not that long ago. and, to compound matters, and as seen in the grades of GWB (and Gore, and Kerry), there is no way anyone coasts along on the "Gentleman's C" anymore and then still glides into, say, Penn Law in the way that it was possible now 40 years ago.
it just drives me crazy, how Ms. Sotomayor will be forced to prove her worth in a way that we'd never, ever ask of Roberts or Alito.
as for the single quote that has been brought up by INDY and Newt, all that she was saying is that experience as an outsider can often inform one's outlook and likely it can breed precisely the type of empathy that Obama is talking about. and what's he talking about? the fact that a judge knows exactly what it is like to be the subject of laws that are often applied disproportionately to minorities. example: how much more severely crack is viewed than regular cocaine.
it's really not that offensive a thing, and it's really not that crazy a thing. it's something that universities have been pushing for years, and businesses as well. why are both such seemingly opposite things so obsessed with diversity? because, in the classroom, the diversity of background makes for a richer, more complex classroom dynamic especially in the humanities, and in the board room, the diversity of background makes it easier to sell whatever products to whatever group of people. i don't think it's at all unreasonable to think that a poor Puerto Rican girl from the projects is going to have a slightly different take on the world than a third-generation Princeton legacy from Greenwich, CT. and while that doesn't act as a qualifier, per se, upon reaching a basic level of qualification, which Ms. Sotomayor certainly has achieved, it might become a distinctive quality upon which a final decision is made.
