Home News

News and Video. Top Stories, World, US, Business, Sci/Tech, Entertainment, Sports, Health, Most Popular.

• America
• Barack Obama
• Congress
• Supreme Court
• United States
• Washington
• White House

Obama On LGBT Pride Month
Thursday, July 2, 2009

PrintEmailPDF

posted by tgazw @ 10:07 AM, ,

Conservatives launch Sotomayor attack

PrintEmailPDF

Prominent Republicans and conservative interest groups seek to portray Sonia Sotomayor as racist and un-American

Prominent Republicans and conservative interest groups have unleashed a campaign to portray President Barack Obama's supreme court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, as racist for suggesting that white men don't always make the best judges and un-American for using a Spanish pronunciation of her name.

What Obama has portrayed as Sotomayor's strength as an American of Puerto Rican descent raised in the Bronx who made it to Princeton and Yale, bringing areas of experience and understanding not immediately evident among the white male majority on the supreme court, is being played by her opponents as evidence that she was nominated because she has a racial agenda.

Newt Gingrich, the Republican former speaker of the house of representatives, and Karl Rove, George Bush's chief strategist, have both called Sotomayor "racist" and said she should withdraw as a nominee over comments she made in 2001. In a talk at the University of California, she offered the view that a female Hispanic judge would better understand certain issues around race and gender than a white male.

"I would hope that a wise Latina woman, with the richness of her experiences, would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life," she said. "Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences, our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging."

To some Americans, Sotomayor's comments appear self-evident. They point to the personal experience that Thurgood Marshall brought as a black man elevated to the supreme court during the civil rights era. But conservatives said her comments are evidence that she will be biased against whites and men.

Gingrich, in a Twitter feed to more than 340,000 followers, said she should resign. "Imagine a judicial nominee said, 'My experience as a white man makes me better than a Latina woman.' New racism is no better than old racism," wrote Gingrich.

He sent a second tweet a few minutes later saying: "White man racist nominee would be forced to withdraw. Latina woman racist should also withdraw."

Rove and two Republican members of congress also called Sotomayor racist.

The White House warned the Republicans to be "exceedingly careful" about such language. Some Republican strategists said the tactic could backfire if it alienates large numbers of Hispanics who support the party.

But other conservatives took up the cudgel.

Rush Limbaugh, the country's most popular talk radio host with millions of listeners, said the party should press the issue.

"If the GOP [Republican party] allows itself to be trapped in the false premise that it's racist and sexist and must show the world that it isn't, then the GOP is extinct," he said.

Critics are also using Sotomayor's pronunciation of her own name as a stick to beat her. The judge, whose parents hail from the Spanish-speaking US territory of Puerto Rico, uses a Hispanic pronunciation. Some critics have taken up a call by a prominent conservative magazine, the National Review, arguing that she should Anglicise it. The writer, Mark Krikorian, said that "there ought to be limits" to the demands made on English-speakers to try and pronounce foreign names.

While the accusations of racism are considered extreme among many Americans, they are likely to shape the challenges to Sotomayor when she faces her congressional confirmation hearing.

Obama sees Sotomayor's background as reflecting the "quality of empathy, of understanding and identifying with people's hopes and struggles, as an essential ingredient" he said he wants to see in the next supreme court justice.

But that experience and understanding is being interpreted by some Republicans as bias. Senator Orrin Hatch, a member of the judiciary committee, portrayed Obama's desire for empathy in a supreme court justice as "a code word for an activist judge".

Hatch, said that while he is keeping an open mind, the judge will have to answer for her 2001 comments. He said he will not support her if she intends to use the law to implement social policy.

"I will focus on determining whether Judge Sotomayor is committed to deciding cases based only on the law as made by the people and their elected representatives, not on personal feelings or politics," Hatch said in a statement.

Critics have also latched on to Sotomayor's history of legal activism in the 1980s when she served on the board of a legal group tackling discrimination against minorities in New York and cases involving alleged racism involved in police brutality and the imposition of the death penalty.

The group won cases that redrew constituency boundaries to increase the number of Hispanic elected officials. It also launched a defamation case, and lost, against a former Reagan administration official for claiming that most Puerto Ricans in the city were on food stamps.

• Sonia Sotomayor


• US Supreme Court


• Obama administration


• Race issues


• Barack Obama


• United States

guardian.co.uk ? Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

posted by tgazw @ 2:58 AM, ,

What's $16 billion among friends?

PrintEmailPDF

How Canadian can you get?

The Finance Minister understates the deficit by $16 billion. Do we get mad?

Nah. The guy's doing his best. Let's give him another chance.

Canadian Press:

OTTAWA - Canadians appear to be willing to cut Finance Minister Jim Flaherty a little slack over his deficit shocker.

A Canadian Press Harris-Decima poll shows few Canadians think the
finance minister should resign just because he made a $16-billion
mistake on his deficit projection.

The survey of 1,000 people finds only 28 per cent who want Flaherty to
step down, while 59 per cent think he should stay on the job.

Even among Liberal supporters, 54 per cent don't think he should lose
his position because the budget deficit has ballooned to more than $50
billion - not the $34 billion predicted in the budget four months ago.

posted by tgazw @ 2:12 AM, ,

Obama wants public option in health care bill -- and wants it done by October

PrintEmailPDF

Following up on yesterday's White House health care reform strategy session with a group of Democratic Senators, today, the President sent a letter to Senators Kennedy and Baucus reiterating his support for the public option. We got a copy of the letter:

The plans you are discussing embody my core belief that Americans should have better choices for health insurance, building on the principle that if they like the coverage they have now, they can keep it, while seeing their costs lowered as our reforms take hold. But for those who don't have such options, I agree that we should create a health insurance exchange -- a market where Americans can one-stop shop for a health care plan, compare benefits and prices, and choose the plan that's best for them, in the same way that Members of Congress and their families can. None of these plans should deny coverage on the basis of a preexisting condition, and all of these plans should include an affordable basic benefit package that includes prevention, and protection against catastrophic costs. I strongly believe that Americans should have the choice of a public health insurance option operating alongside private plans. This will give them a better range of choices, make the health care market more competitive, and keep insurance companies honest.

I want health care like members of Congress and their families have. Actually, if members of Congress and their families had health insurance like most of us have, this system would have been changed years ago. But, we are where we are. And, we're ready for real health care reform legislation to pass.

According to The Hill, this progress on the public option should make us liberals happy:

By plunging into the details of the reform rather than cheering from the sidelines, as he has done for months, Obama raises the political stakes for the summer?"s big legislative battle, and will hearten liberals who have yearned for his intervention to put a public sector option on the table.

Health Care for America Now (HCAN) liked Obama's letter:

We are thrilled to see President Obama's strong, unambiguous commitment to reform that includes the choice of keeping private health insurance or joining a new public health insurance option. The choice of a new public health insurance plan is the only way to control costs, guarantee coverage, ensure quality and transparency, and set a benchmark by which patients will know whether their private health insurance is truly giving them what they're paying for.

There is tremendous unity among President Obama, key committee leadership in both the House and the Senate, the broad coalition represented by Health Care for America Now, and the American people for reform based on the choice of private or public health insurance plans. It is now clearer than ever that this choice will be a fundamental part of the reform sent to the President's desk this year.

Okay. Let's get this moving NOW. The public option is going to send the insurance industry into a lobbying frenzy. But, it has to be part of the package.

Obama wants the legislation on his desk by October. Congress better get it done. And, better not screw it up. There's such great potential for that.

posted by tgazw @ 1:46 AM, ,

Primetime Emmys Moved Up a Week

PrintEmailPDF

The TV gold rush will start earlier this year. The 61st Primetime Emmy Awards has been rescheduled to Sunday, Sept. 13, a week earlier than the original date, CBS announced.

The move was made to accommodate ...

Read More >

posted by tgazw @ 12:26 AM, ,

Archives

• Jun 1, 2009
• Jun 3, 2009
• Jun 6, 2009
• Jun 7, 2009
• Jun 8, 2009
• Jun 9, 2009
• Jun 11, 2009
• Jun 14, 2009
• Jun 25, 2009
• Jun 27, 2009
• Jun 29, 2009
• Jul 1, 2009
• Jul 2, 2009
• Jul 15, 2009
• Jul 16, 2009
• Current Posts

Previous Posts

• WHY ARE WE BAILING OUT GENERAL MOTORS?
• The Weekend Wrap: The Tiller Assassination
• Obama heading overseas
• More movie magic Pinewood aims to be a one-stop st...
• Monolith hiring for new 'first-person action game'
• NBC Sets Premiere Date for Jay Leno Show
• Turnout is Key Factor in New Jersey GOP Primary
• Progressives Divided?
• Deeds On The Air In NoVA
• Brew for the Tea Parties: ??Reagan?"s Unfinished A...

Links

• Top Stories
• World
• US
• Business
• Sci/Tech
• Entertainment
• Sports
• Health
• Most Popular

© 2009 Home News | Site Feed | Back to top