Sotomayor, a political pick?

... On May 3, 2009, responding to an ABC analysis that Obama's pick to replace Souter would not be based on politics, I wrote in part:

Obama's pick to replace Souter may be a woman... may be a Latino... may be an African-American, or any combination of the three. But one thing is absolutely bedrock sure: the most left-wing senator of the last four years who is now the President will definitely pick a nominee every bit to the left as he is. This is the predominant criteria under consideration. If there is anything that should have been learned over the course of Obama's first 100 days, it is that he will take our nation as far to the left politically, socially, economically, and judicially as he can.


Here is Ramesh Ponnuru (of National Review and The Washington Post) summarizing his take on Obama's pick of Judge Sotomayer to replace Justice Souter on the Supreme Court:

--Judge Sotomayor believes that the courts are "where policy is made."

--She has Democratic colleagues who wonder if she has the intellect to be on the high court.

--She was picked by a president who has announced that he has a pro-abortion litmus test and that he wants judges who will rule with empathy, at least for some groups.

--She has a high reversal rate. In one case, the Supreme Court has voted unanimously to reverse her.

We will doubtless learn more about Sotomayor, both good and bad, in the days to come. But based on the early signs it appears that President Obama has made the crassest of political picks.


And over at NRO's Bench Memos:

Sotomayor for the Court [Wendy Long]

Judge Sotomayor is a liberal judicial activist of the first order who thinks her own personal political agenda is more important that the law as written. She thinks that judges should dictate policy, and that one's sex, race, and ethnicity ought to affect the decisions one renders from the bench.

She reads racial preferences and quotas into the Constitution, even to the point of dishonoring those who preserve our public safety (link added). On September 11, America saw firsthand the vital role of America's firefighters in protecting our citizens. They put their lives on the line for her and the other citizens of New York and the nation. But Judge Sotomayor would sacrifice their claims to fair treatment in employment promotions to racial preferences and quotas. The Supreme Court is now reviewing that decision.

She has an extremely high rate of her decisions being reversed, indicating that she is far more of a liberal activist than even the current liberal activist Supreme Court.


Is anyone really surprised?

Opine for the day...

A Catholic friend of mine recounted to me how he has been more focussed on his business of late after letting it slide over the last 5 years as he pursued a pipe dream. He's a husband and father... and a good guy. He was telling me how he has so much happening work-wise, making money to pull himself out of debt, thus better providing for himself and his family. He asked, rather rhetorically, "does that make me a better person?"

My reply to him:
Your reorientated priorities do not make you a better person per se, as relates to righteousness before God (of course you already knew that ;-). But you are a better person as relates to bringing home the bacon... providing... and I imagine it is more satisfying and esteem building. God made man to have dominion over the earth. To rule it wisely. Our little piece of the earth is made up of our families, our jobs, our relationships, our time, etc. It seems the non-glamorous stuff of life is what constitutes our path of growth and glory, depending on how we handle it. That's not to say it's the path to salvation from sin and death. That alone is the free gift of our God, by grace through faith in Christ. But this stuff of life is the path God has given for our sanctification and entering into practical godliness. And it is the struggle of life. Our short-sighted desires pull us away from this high calling that is soooo mundane and full of everyday drab, disappointments, and challenges (thorns and thistles from the curse in Gen. 3). But as our Lord taught, "He who saves (keeps) his life shall lose it, but he who loses his life for My sake shall find it." The right path often doesn't feel good at the moment, but as we continue to walk it we find a growing deposit in us that is His work. And as we often fail, we take refuge in the knowledge of God's full acceptance of us in His Son our Saviour who lived the perfect life that we can't and has credited it to our account... and then we enter the battle once again.

He wrote back, "Amen friend."

Our National Debt Road Trip...

This says it all regarding the fiscally "more responsible" Obama:

Friday reading (May 15th)...

Social Security... in worse shape than you thought

Our Economy... on a certain path to hell in a hand basket

The Pelosi-CIA dance - U.S. security - the tortured saga

Grace and Sacraments

Majority of Americans identify as pro-life

I remember hearing this song for the first time in the late sixties on FM radio. The FM band was fairly new and the place to hear new music that played longer than the AM band 3 minute limit. Steve Winwood and Eric Clapton were two members of the short-lived Blind Faith. Here they are years later performing "In The Presence of the Lord."



later....

Bring out your dead... (or almost dead?)

In an Washington Times editorial, Obama's health care rationing, Obama is quoted as saying, "There's always going to be an asymmetry of information between patient and provider," he said. "And part of what I think government can do effectively is to be an honest broker in assessing and evaluating treatment options." He stated that "the chronically ill and those toward the end of their lives are accounting for potentially 80 percent of the total health care bill out here."



The editorial concludes with this: "The time to really worry about your health is when a government bureaucrat, not your personal doctor, tells you what treatment you can have. Yet that's exactly the scenario endorsed by Mr. Obama. This position clearly leads to health care rationing. Nobody in the government or in any "political channels" should tell individuals how to make decisions about "the end of their lives." The only conversations happening should be personal, not democratic. It's not up to government to pull the plug."

A Craven "Age of Enlightenment" in Europe...

Mark Steyn has written an excellent article summing up the reality of things in Europe and England regarding current and future demographics and its impact on the Jews of those nations. The sooner-than-you-think to be Muslim controlled countries have essentially already abdicated their moral authority to a new craven age of enlightenment. The result is the rise of a Muslim consensus in these countries through intimidation and violence that is bringing about their new reasonable and pragmatic solution to the Israeli problem. The article is Israel Today, The West Tomorrow found at Commentary online.

Imagine....

Souter to retire from Supreme Court

Speculation is in the offing throughout the press this past weekend as to who President Obama will nominate to replace Justice Souter. ABC News Online has an article entitled Diversity, Not Politics, Key To Court Pick. Don't bet on it...

Obama's pick to replace Souter may be a woman... may be a Latino... may be an African-American, or any combination of the three. But one thing is absolutely bedrock sure: the most left-wing senator of the last four years who is now the President will definitely pick a nominee every bit to the left as he is. This is the predominant criteria under consideration. If there is anything that should have been learned over the course of Obama's first 100 days, it is that he will take our nation as far to the left politically, socially, economically, and judicially as he can.

Don't doubt it.