Sotomayor, WWCRD?, Colorado's Checkbook to Victory

Durbin vs Gingrich
Roger Simon
Wesley Pruden




Well, sharpen your long knives and scalpels, ladies and gentlemen, because it's finally time to cut up and dissect the new Supreme Court nominee! Just because the nominee is a woman and a Hispanic, no need for sensitivity, let's find out the dirt in her past or be creative and make some up... I'm surprised how fast the media is coming up with reactions to Obama's anouncement of Sonia Sotomayor. Those that favor her are stressing her judicial experience, with the phrase "more federal judicial experience to the Supreme Court than any justice in 100 years" will be repeated in an endless Mobius loop. To her detractors, she's an obvious activist judge, whatever that means, since the interpretation can only be subjective, and they warn against "legislating from the bench."

Why he chose Sotomayor, from Politico: "President Barack Obama called Judge Sonia Sotomayor at 9 p.m. on Memorial Day to say she was his pick for the Supreme Court.
Obama showed he was willing to pick a fight with his choice — Republicans do not consider her a “consensus” choice and had telegraphed that they considered her the most liberal of the four finalists.

He played smart base politics with the historic choice of a Hispanic (a first) and a woman.

And he fulfilled his pledge to pick someone with a common touch by nominating someone who was raised in a Bronx housing project, and lost her father at age 9.

As the most arguably liberal of the four finalists, Sotomayor provides the most fodder for conservative groups, which have vowed to spend millions of dollars on television advertising. Leaders hope a court brawl will help rebuild their movement.

Democrats like that Justice David Souter is being replaced by a Hispanic woman, and feel sure she’ll be confirmed. As insurance, they note that when she was confirmed for the federal appeals court in 1988, among those voting for her were then-Sen. Bill Frist and then-Sen. Rick Santorum, both of whom are abortion opponents.

Democrats contend that Sotomayor does not have a long paper trail on hot-button social issues, especially abortion. In one case, the administration will argue she came down on the side of judicial restraint."

Here are two reactions as reported from the Boston Globe, the opinions are the reverse of what I thought they'd be:

William Redpath, Libertarian National Committee chairman: “While Judge Sotomayor deserves a fair and impartial hearing, Supreme Court justices should be nominated for their thorough knowledge of and adherence to the Constitution and the rule of law. By nominating Sonia Sotomayor, Barack Obama has made it clear he prefers an activist for his personal causes over a rational interpreter of law."

Larry Klayman, founder of Judicial Watch: "While I would have liked to see a more conservative libertarian type on the high court, President Obama's selection of New York federal appeals court Judge Sonia Sotomayer, was a very prudent and wise decision from a far left liberal like Obama."

Normally, the nominee is treated with respect from the judicial committee, then the gloves come off during the full Senate hearing. It won't be as rough and tumble as the current Lakers versus Nuggets basketball series, but there should be enough embarrassing gaffes by stupid Congress members, get ready for Michele Bachmann and John Boehner everybody, I sense another drinking game being created!!

Boy, everyone wants to be a comic and cynically comment on events like North Korea's atomic bomb tests. Now I give you Wesley Pruden in the Reverend Moon backed Washibngton Times: "Ban Ki-moon, the U.N. secretary-general, is "deeply worried," and President Obama is "gravely concerned" about North Korean behavior. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called the test not only "erroneous," but "misguided." China is "resolutely opposed" to such nuclear explosions, and the Japanese foreign minister said the test "cannot be tolerated," whatever that means, and suggested that the U.N. might consider using its penultimate weapon, a resolution of concern. Such a resolution could even "regret" and "lament." If that doesn't work, the U.N. could unleash its "doomsday weapon," a resolution going far beyond mere regret to "deploring" international naughtiness. Take that, you naughty guys."

Roger Simon in Politico looks at what might happen if we had Dick Cheney and Rush Limbaugh in charge of the crisis: "Blah, blah, blah, blah. All this must sound pretty weak to a Cheney-Limbaugh ticket. That ticket would be for direct, swift, concrete action, the kind of action that can routinely be found on the TV show “24” and other fantasies.

So there are four key questions to be asked today, questions that Cheney and Limbaugh certainly will ask in the weeks ahead:

1. Why didn’t U.S. commandos grab some high-ranking North Korean official, smuggle him out of the country by submarine, take him to Guantanamo and subject him to “enhanced interrogation techniques” until he spilled the beans about the nuclear tests? That way, the United States could have done … something. We do not know what. But something.

2. Why hasn’t Cheney been consulted on a daily basis since leaving office? As Cheney pointed out in his speech to the American Enterprise Institute on May 21, “Being the first vice president who had also served as secretary of defense, naturally my duties tended toward national security. I focused on those challenges day to day, mostly free from the usual political distractions.” (His experience with national security and freedom from political distraction did not lead him to prevent the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, but, hey, nobody is perfect.) The point Cheney was making is that he has this terrific résumé and even fewer distractions today, seeing as how he is out of work. “Today, I’m an even freer man,” Cheney said in his speech. So why don’t we have him under contract before somebody — Libya, Syria, Disneyland — snaps him up?

3. Why isn’t Rush Limbaugh’s radio show currently broadcast in North Korea? Why does our government not beam Limbaugh’s show into that country? It would be an instant hit. North Koreans know all about being “dittoheads.”

4. Why isn’t somebody being waterboarded right now? It has worked so well in the past."

Breakout your credit cards and checkbooks, Colorado Republicans, because you can now buy your way to political victory come next election. according to an article in the Reverend Moon backed Washington Times: "Colorado voters swung for Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, ousted Republican Rep. Marilyn Musgrave and kept Democrats in charge of the state' General Assembly. Given that Colorado already had a Democratic governor and two Democratic senators, the election effectively erased the Republicans' last hold on what was once a bright red state and moved it into the purple - or even blue - column.

But unlike the national Republican Party, which is fighting among itself as it tries to find a voice to counter a popular president, party leaders in Colorado have jumped into action.

"They have to add money and think tanks - in other words, try to reverse-engineer the infrastructure that the Democrats put in over the last four years," said Denver pollster Floyd Ciruli. "The good news is that the old guard recognizes the problem and is trying to help." This means that there are opportunities to get money without working for it from rich Republicans by using the tried and true scams: creating think tanks and activist organizations with words like Taxpayers, Liberty, Independence, and American in them to begin the salivation, with greenbacks not far behind...