Conservatives launch Sotomayor attack
Sunday, June 14, 2009
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PDF 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.
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Conservatives launch Sotomayor attack
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Conservatives launch Sotomayor attack
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Conservatives launch Sotomayor attack
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posted by 77767 @ 6:33 PM,
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Tony La Russa Sues Twitter Over Fake Profile
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Tony La Russa Sues Twitter Over Fake Profile
[Source: Good Times Society - by The American Illuminati]
Tony La Russa Sues Twitter Over Fake Profile
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Tony La Russa Sues Twitter Over Fake Profile
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posted by 77767 @ 5:06 PM,
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Security stepped up at abortion clinics in US after killing of Dr George Tiller
PrintEmailPDF Controversy sharpens as man arrested in connection with shooting revealed to have links to rightwing militias
The US ordered increased security for abortion doctors and clinics todayas details emerged of close links between the man held for the murder of one of the country's most prominent abortion ?doctors and rightwing militias with strong anti-government views.
The killing of Dr George Tiller at his ?Kansas church on Sunday, and the arrest of 51 year-old Scott Roeder as he fled the scene, has added fresh impetus to the abortion debate shortly before congressional hearings begin for Sonia Sotomayor, Barack Obama's nominee to the supreme court, at which she is certain to be pressed for her views on the issue.
In Washington the attorney general, Eric Holder, ordered the US marshals service to step up protection of abortion doctors and their clinics, many of which have routine protection after years of being ?targeted by extremists and mainstream anti-abortion groups. Nine abortion ?doctors, clinic workers and others have been murdered in recent years. Tiller was wearing a bulletproof jacket when he was shot in the head, and frequently travelled with bodyguards after he was wounded in an earlier assassination attempt.
Obama denounced the killing. ?"However profound our differences as Americans over difficult issues such as abortion, they cannot be resolved by heinous acts of violence," he said.
But some prominent anti-abortion activists came close to justifying it. ?Randall Terry, founder of the largest anti-abortion group, Operation Rescue, issued a statement that fell short of condemning the murder and tried to shift attention to the political fight by warning that Obama would now use it to pressure organisations which describe themselves as "pro-life".
"George Tiller was a mass murderer.We grieve for him that he did not have time to properly prepare his soul to face God," he said."I am more concerned that the Obama administration will use Tiller's killing to intimidate pro-lifers into surrendering our most effective rhetoric and actions. Abortion is still murder. And we still must call abortion by its proper name: murder."
Dave Leach, editor of an anti-abortion newsletter, Prayer and Action News, to which Roeder occasionally contributed told the New York Times he had once met the alleged killer. "To call this a crime is too simplistic," Leach said. "There is Christian scripture that would support this."
Roeder's family said in a statement they were "shocked, horrified and filled with sadness at the death of Dr Tiller". "We know Scott as a kind and loving son, brother and father who suffered from mental illness at various times in his life," the family said. "However, none of us ever saw Scott as a person capable of or willing to take another person's life."
Others painted a picture of a more extreme man. Roeder has been identified as the likely poster of questions about Tiller on Operation Rescue's website. Among other things, a man with his name suggested going to Tiller's church to confront him and other members of the congregation over his work.
"Blaess (sic) everyone for attending and praying in May to bring justice to Tiller and the closing of his death camp," he wrote. "Sometime soon, would it be feasible to organize as many people as possible to attend Tillers church (inside, not just outside) to have much more of a presence and possibly ask questions of the Pastor, Deacons, Elders and members while there?"
In 1996, Roeder was convicted over the discovery of explosives and bomb-making equipment, along with a military rifle, gas mask and ammunition, in his car and sentenced to two years in prison. But his conviction was overturned on appeal on the grounds that the police had illegally searched his car.
The FBI identified Roeder as a member of the anti-government Freemen group, which described itself as made up of Christian patriots, whose leaders were sentenced to prison terms after a three month armed stand-off with law enforcement forces in Montana 13 years ago.
The Kansas City Star newspaper quoted a man identified as commander of the Kansas Unorganized Citizens Militia in the mid-1990s, Morris Wilson, as saying he knew Roeder at the time. "I'd say he's a good ol' boy, except he was just so fanatic about abortion," Wilson said. "He was always talking about how awful abortion was." Operation Rescue denounced the killing as "vigilantism" and cowardly.
It said it instead wanted to see Tiller "brought to justice" for what it regards as the murder of the unborn.
guardian.co.uk ? Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Security stepped up at abortion clinics in US after killing of Dr George Tiller
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Security stepped up at abortion clinics in US after killing of Dr George Tiller
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Security stepped up at abortion clinics in US after killing of Dr George Tiller
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Security stepped up at abortion clinics in US after killing of Dr George Tiller
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posted by 77767 @ 3:51 PM,
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Emma Soames on fashion and style for the older generation
PrintEmailPDF My cup of sartorial joy brims over with the discovery of Ari Cohen's blog, Advanced Style, which chronicles the style of the chicest, wackiest and best dressed of America's older generation. Here you will find inspiration from vintage style mavens, ranging from 93-year-old model Mimi Weddell, to a dude from Seattle whose fine legs are displayed in stockings and who is topped off with a blazer and cap. Then there's fabric designer Elizabeth Sweetheart, who dresses entirely in green - a different outfit every day. She was recently profiled in New York magazine where she explained the genesis of her eccentric but bizarrely successful look. "I began wearing green nail varnish and it just spread all over me."
Cohen, 27, started the blog last summer. He works in the bookstore at the New Museum but originally came from Seattle where his best friend was his grandmother. "I adored my grandparents. Older people's style has evolved and they don't mind what other people think so much. They just aren't so self-conscious." He says that when he moved to New York last May he noticed immediately how vibrant and stylish older people in the city were, and wanted to start a project to bring that into focus.
The site is gathering momentum along with a mood of greater acceptance and respect for the older practitioners of style consciousness. "People have started to notice older people more," explains Cohen. "You can learn so much from the way an old person wears a coat that they have had for ever with maybe a hat, for instance - these are the last people around who know how to dress formally and they have a confidence about them that younger people just don't have."
Recent trends spotted on the site include bright red lipstick and huge dark glasses - neither of which are age specific but do look fabulous on the denizens of Advanced Style. There's no doubt that when the fat lady finally starts singing, she will do so in Balenciaga, with a slash of red lipstick and possibly some kid gloves taken out of a closet and smelling of the lavender in which they were for decades preserved.
? Emma Soames is editor-at-large of Saga magazine.
guardian.co.uk ? Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Emma Soames on fashion and style for the older generation
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posted by 77767 @ 3:16 PM,
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