Obama's brilliant Sotomayor pick

By Michael J.W. Stickings

John Dickerson is right. The Sotomayor pick checks all the boxes.

Notably, of course, Sotomayor is a Hispanic woman -- if confirmed, she'll be only the third woman on the Court, and the first Hispanic. But what her right-wing critics, and conservatives generally, don't get, given their knee-jerk impetuosity, is that the boxes don't all have to do with her demographic identity, and certainly not with affirmative action. As Dickerson notes, she's also bipartisan, experienced, liberal, and smart, with a broad "legal range" and an impressive, uplifting biography.

In short, Sonia Sotomayor is, in a word, qualified. And that's what matters most here.

As Sen. Patrick Leahy, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, put it at HuffPo:

Judge Sotomayor has a long and distinguished career on the federal bench. She has been nominated by both Democratic and Republican presidents, and she was twice confirmed by the Senate with strong, bipartisan support. Her record is exemplary. Judge Sotomayor's nomination is an historic one, and when confirmed she will become the first Hispanic Justice, and just the third woman to sit on the nation's highest court. Having a Supreme Court that better reflects the diversity of America helps ensure that we keep faith with the words engraved in Vermont marble over the entrance of the Supreme Court: "Equal justice under law."

That's exactly right. And, indeed, diversity is a key virtue. It's not that Obama has nominated just any Hispanic woman, or a Hispanic woman just to check off those boxes. Rather, he's nominated a supremely qualified one. That she is a woman, and Hispanic, is a bonus -- a double bonus. It is essential not just to have solid (perhaps great) legal minds on the Court (Thomas would be the notable exception), but to have different perspectives as well. The fact is, contrary to what the fundamentalists of the right believe, there is no one right way to interpret the law, no absolute right and absolute wrong. On the contrary, constitutional law is a world of nuance -- as the law is generally. Judges (and lawyers and legal scholars as well) bring not just their bookish expertise to the job but also who they are, their experiences in the world. And the fact is, one's experiences (and perspectives) are shaped not just by one's education and career but by one's race and religion and gender and sexual orientation and every other element of one's identity. And so it matters that the nine judges on the highest court in the land reflect America, even if they do not perfectly represent it, even if they are not, and are not supposed to be, the people's representatives. Besides, no one is suggesting that there have to be, according to some plan, a certain number of women or Jews or gays on the Court. All we are saying is that diversity matters -- as long as it is not achieved at the expense of overall expertise.

The right is already slamming Sotomayor as an affirmative action case, of course, but the fact is, opponents not just of Sotomayor but of liberal (or non-fundamentalist) nominees generally would use this argument against any woman and any Hispanic -- indeed, against anyone who isn't one of them. They prefer their while men, after all, men like Roberts and Alito, and when someone like Thomas is nominated, a black man, it's fine as long as, and only as long as, the nominee is one of them ideologically. This is yet another example of the shameless hypocrisy of conservatives.

Right now, though, just hours after the announcement, Sotomayor's opponents (and, really, Obama's) are going for a Kitchen Sink approach for their smear campaign: She's an affirmative action case, she's a crazy leftist, etc. What they're hoping is that something, anything, sticks. Take Dear Leader Rush, for example, who predictably spewed his venom all over Sotomayor, calling her a "hack" and a "disaster" and Obama a "racist" and otherwise dismissing her, hatefully, as an unqualified loser: "So she's not the brain that they're portraying her to be, she's not a constitutional jurist. She is an affirmative action case extraordinaire and she has put down white men in favor of Latina women."

Well, what did you expect? Others on the right, notably those in Congress, may soften their rhetoric a bit, but do not doubt for a moment that Limbaugh's multi-pronged assault on Sotomayor is the standard conservative line on Sotomayor. It will be swallowed in full and regurgitated ad nauseam over the next few months.

For more on the early conservative response to the nomination, see Think Progress. One conservative, the Committee for Justice's Curt Levey, has compared Sotomayor to Harriet Miers, which is both insulting and stupid. National Review's Ramesh Ponnuru, makes the same idiotic comparison. While some are playing the affirmative action card (as well as the identity card: Republicvan Sen. James Inhofe, for example, is suggesting that Sotomayor's race and gender unduly influence her -- but, then, if that's true, do they not also unduly influence Inhofe and his white male agenda?), the dominant line of attack seems to be the completely unfounded accusation that Sotomayor is "not the smartest," as The Weekly Standard's Fred Barnes put it. Conservative won't get very far trying to tear apart her intellect, or supposed lack thereof. But, then, they also won't get very far implying that women and Hispanics shouldn't be on the Court -- and, as Dahlia Lithwick puts it, "by attacking her as too darn human."

The most idiotic comment I've come across so far comes (via TP) from Barnes's colleague Michael Goldfarb: "[O]n the issue of diversity, Obama seems to have the views of a 21-year-old Hispanic girl -- that is, only by having a black president, an Hispanic justice, a female secretary of State, and Bozo the Clown as vice president will the United States become a true 'vanguard of societal ideas and changes.'" (WTF? There is absolutely zero basis for this. Not that that ever stops conservatives from vomiting up every last ounce of poison to support their partisan agenda.)

Meanwhile, back in reality, Sotomayor's confirmation should be fairly easy. Why? Again, because she is, before all else, qualified. And because Obama made a brilliant, "inspiring" pick.

As Greenwald puts it, and I concur (though of course I have my questions, and there are questions she will need to answer), "this seems to be a superb pick for Obama." (Make sure to read Glenn's post in full -- though I must disagree with his assessment of The New Republic, which, however much involved in the early smear campaign against Sotomayor, is, in my view, a bastion of thoughtful liberalism. Yes, even Jeffrey Rosen, one of her critics at TNR, supports her enthusiastically.)

Stay tuned. We'll have much, much more on the Sotomayor nomination going forward.