It's the third day of Senate confirmation hearings for Sonia Sotomayor, President Barack Obama's choice for the U.S. Supreme Court. The Takeaway's Washington Correspondent Todd Zwillich joins us with the latest. We are also joined by David Kopel, who will be testifying against the Supreme Court nominee. David Kopel works for the Independence Institute as a researcher and is a policy analyst with the conservative Cato Institute.
Here's Sen. Sessions quizzing Sonia Sotomayor yesterday:
Please stay on topic, be civil, and be brief.
Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments. Names are displayed with all comments. WNYC reserves the right to edit any comments posted on this site. Please read the WNYC.org Comment Guidelines before posting.
The Takeaway is a national morning news program that invites listeners to be part of the American conversation. Hosts John Hockenberry and Celeste Headlee, along with partners The New York Times, BBC World Service, WNYC, Public Radio International and WGBH Boston, deliver news and analysis and help you prepare for the day ahead.
The show is a co-production of WNYC Radio and Public Radio International, in collaboration with The BBC World Service, New York Times Radio and WGBH Boston.
Major funding provided by:
[Continuing]
****
"Then she tries to suggest that the speech was descriptive rather than normative, and, what’s more, said only that sex and ethnicity might make a difference. Kyl then points out that, no, she really said they do make it a difference. And he agrees that, yes, they might — but this is not a good thing, and we should be on guard against it. But, he continues, you don’t say this is something to be on guard against: You say it’s a good thing. She concludes by saying, well, yes, maybe I should have chosen different words. I’m sure now she wishes she had — that is, hadn’t said what she really thought, which is that judges should practice identity politics."
****
Moronic, indeed John Hockenberry. It would simply have been nice for you to do what you are supposed to do, and report the story as intelligently as others are.
As for the substance of Hockeberry's banal assertion that Republicans' questioning of Judge Sotomayor was "moronic," consider this comment drawn from the Bench Memos webage of the National Review Online website:
[In two parts due to the limitation on the number of characters.]
****
"Senator Kyl was masterful. He’s exactly right that, from that speech, the critics have taken nothing out of context; rather, the context just makes everything worse. Her initial response to Senator Kyl’s thorough demonstration that the speech says judges will and should be influenced by their sex and ethnicity in their rulings was, not to deny that this is what the speech says, but that her jurisprudence belies this. I don’t think Frank Ricci would agree..."
****
I just heard John Hockenberry refer to Republicans' questioning of Judge Sotomayor on the "wise Latina" speech as being "moronic."
John Hockenberry apparently has no time for serious legal or philosphical thinking; he's too busy getting to what "The Takeaway" is in any story. This is only the latest in a long string of incidents involving this program that belie any claim that NPR stands for serious, lengthy examination of news and current events. John Hockenberry's raison d'etre seems to be to combine the worst of commercial radio (quick, glossy, superficial stories in rapid-fire presentations) with the worst of public radio (a concerted, knee-jerk liberal bias).