The evidence keeps piling up against Sotormayor, and now President Gingrich has joined Tom “Nuke Mecca” Tancredo and Rush Limbaugh in deciding she is a racist:
On Wednesday, Gingrich tweeted: “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.”
Moments later, he followed up with the message: “White man racist nominee would be forced to withdraw. Latina woman racist should also withdraw.”
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs responded to Gingrich’s criticism at Wednesday’s briefing.
In other news, Nate Silver has the greatest blog post title ever:
“Grandmother of World’s 23rd Best Economist Posthumously Offended by Sonia Sotomayor’s Spending Habits; Will Obama Withdraw Nomination?”
Is that unfair? You be the judge:
Apparently, the new Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor is an example of the latter. The Washington Post reports that the 54-year-old Sotomayer has a $179,500 yearly salary but
On her financial disclosure report for 2007, she said her only financial holdings were a Citibank checking and savings account, worth $50,000 to $115,000 combined. During the previous four years, the money in the accounts at some points was listed as low as $30,000.
My grandmother would have been shocked and appalled to see someone who makes so much save so little.
Nate unpacks why this is such a ridiculous statement, and shoots any number of holes in it, but what I thought was amazing was how unaware Mankiw was of the America the vast majority of people live in around him. How about a show of hands of people who have less than $50-115,000 sitting around in their savings account. Yeah. That is kind of what I thought.
Meanwhile, Karl “Permanent Republican Majority” Rove thinks she might be stupid:
Rove – “She is competent and will be confirmed….She has an interesting and compelling life story…”
Charlie – “She is very smart.”
Rove – “Not necessarily.”
Charlie – “What do you mean? She went to Princeton where she graduating with honors and then went on to Yale Law School….”
Rove – “I know lots of stupid people who went to Ivy League schools.” The crowd applauds.
Sotomayor didn’t just attend Princeton, she graduated summa cum laude. She didn’t just attend Yale Law School, she edited the Yale Law Journal.
Last night I noted that the only question the Republicans needed to answer was whether or not they are going to filibuster, and then figure out what to do from there. If not, they should go into damage control, and by all appearances it seems like they will not filibuster:
Sessions appeared on the Today show, and said that Sotomayor “has serious problems.” And he urged against rushing through to a confirmation. “But I would think that we would all have a good hearing, take our time, and do it right,” he said. “And then the senators cast their vote up or down based on whether or not they think this is the kind of judge that should be on the court.”
However, he also added: “I don’t sense a filibuster in the works.”
Instead of realizing there is no real political upside here and spinning into damage control, they seem to have gone berserk, and I haven’t even visited NRO, the Weekly Standard, or any of the various wingnut blogs I regularly read. Most of what is quoted here is from top-tier Republicans- former elected officials and the leadership and brains of the party (with the exception of the Nate Silver post). Meanwhile, as usual, one guy sort of gets it but is helpless to do anything:
Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele told CNN Radio Tuesday the party that he hopes will include more Hispanics must be cautious in how it scrutinizes a groundbreaking Latina judge.
“You want to be careful,” he said when asked about juggling Hispanic outreach with potential opposition to Sotomayor, “You don’t want to be perceived as a bully.”
But overall, the new Republican leader is calling for the GOP to avoid the explosive rhetoric attached to many Supreme Court fights.
“I think our party right now will avoid the partisan knee-jerk judgements that typically come with these things,” Steele said.
The funny thing about this is that despite all his faults, Steele has, for the most part, seen all the landmines his wingnut cohorts are tap-dancing through, but can’t do anything about it. And what makes that even funnier is that Michael Steele will be the one blamed for the GOP fail in 2010, when there was, quite literally, nothing he could do.
*** Update ***
Jeebus. Rumproast and I are on the same wave length.
TR
Did Mankiw’s grandmother own a condo in Greenwich Village like Sotomayor does? Because I’d imagine some of her salary has been directed to that minor expense.
Rick Taylor
Meanwhile, George W Bush liked to poke fun of highly educated people by pointing that the C student was the President.
And to repeat myself, this from the party that proudly gave us Sarah Palin for Vice President.
They don’t care anymore; they’re only speaking to the base. No one else could take this seriously.
Jay B.
That’s OK, I suspect the GOP rebound in ’10 will start in Florida, where Mike Huckabee and Jeb Jr. are going all in with Rubio — already — against the largely empty suited, wildly popular (to the average Floridian) Republican Charlie Crist in the primary. If they manage to torpedo Crist, sky’s the limit for a far-right anti-Castro deadender.
BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
KRK
Golly, whom could Karl be thinking of? Of course, Sotomayor wasn’t a legacy admission, so she had to get in on merit.
Just Some Fuckhead
Nothing that can’t be solved by replacing Steele with Mel Martinez.
Calouste
Karl Rove was of course referring to his former boss, who got into an Ivy League school via the affirmative action program (rich white guy section). And probably quite a few of his appointments.
SrirachaHotSauce
You just can’t make up shit like that.
I bet the whole Bush family got a chuckle out of that one.
Har-dee-fuckin-har!
Oh my god. I have to wipe my eyes here.
jwb
Delong:
Zifnab
@Jay B.: Does this mean the seat won’t be going to Katherine Harris?
J.W. Hamner
I noticed Sessions said today he didn’t think there was going to be a filibuster… so at least early on i don’t think the Senate is going all in with this nonsense and are aware of the optics as much as anybody else. It’ll be interesting to see if the Limbaugh Wing succeeds in forcing a symbolic gesture of loyalty from them.
The Cat Who Would Be Tunch
And to think that Mankiw was the author of my college economic textbooks.
You know, ironically, if many of the conservatives wanted to provide a legitimate excuse as to why they’re brushing off Sotomayor’s many academic achievements at top US institutions, they need only to offer themselves as examples.
Jindal, a Rhodes Scholar, advocating against government intervention and using a Republican administration’s response to a natural disaster as a reason. Now we have a Harvard economist criticizing Sotomayor based upon what his grandmother would have thought.
Mankiw’s update is priceless.
Jay B.
@Zifnab:
[Shudders]
gnomedad
Nothing needs to make any sense. In fact, the less sense anything makes, the less you can argue with it. Keep hurling poop and hope something sticks.
Brachiator
@KRK:
Well, let’s see. There’s Dubya (Yale College, Harvard Business School).
No? Howabout John Roberts (Harvard College and Harvard Law).
But no matter how you slice it, the GOP is burning all their bridges with their vile implication that a white man like Dubya is smart just by setting foot on the Yale campus, while a Latina woman is suspect despite achievements that neither Rove nor Dubya could even attain themselves.
By the way, I can’t find anything in his bio that indicates that Rove graduated from college.
JGabriel
Dead Grandma is pretty close-minded. Must run in the family.
.
Dennis-SGMM
An infinite number of monkeys flinging an infinite amount of poop would look a lot like the Republican party.
PeakVT
Well, I will say this for Mankiw: he has enough self-awareness to realize he is a hack. That is a step up from most wingnuts.
gwangung
Would those or would those many people with less than $50-115K in their bank accounts include Sonia Sotomayor’s brothers/sisters/nieces/nephews? Would that be a good use of her money or not?
Or are we talking about selfish assholes who wouldn’t dream of helping close relatives with a helping hand when they’re better off, like so many first and second generation relatives?
gwangung
@JGabriel: Cheap biddy, too, if she wasn’t helping out the grandkids….
Just Some Fuckhead
Yeah, cuz all the smart people graduated college. Just ask ’em.
TR
Given that she has only one brother and no sisters, it probably wouldn’t make any sense to spend money on all them.
Speaking of not making any sense, can I get a translation on the rest of your comment?
MattF
I’m waiting for the moment when Newt gets the brilliant idea that everyone who agrees with him ought to wear a shirt of a specific color.
gnomedad
@gwangung:
For all we know, she could have little money in savings because she is helping family. Or is that what you were suggesting?
Dennis-SGMM
@gwangung:
One of my dearest friends drives an ’89 Taurus. His eldest son is an assistant District Attorney, his daughter is a distinguished biologist and his youngest son just accepted a commission in the Marine Corps but, he’s not wealthy. Like hell he’s not wealthy.
JasonF
I have a friend who parroted the Mankiw attack to me. When I pointed out that she’s got lifetime tenure in a job that, Constitutionally, can never have its pay reduced, he pivoted seamlessly to “I thought Obama wanted to nominate judges who understand the real world. People in the real world don’t have guaranteed six-figure incomes for life!”
Mnemosyne
Given the events and memes of the past year, I suspect he was referring to Obama, which is why they applauded. Because C-Plus Augustus got in on his own merits (ie by being born to a Yale alumnus) but Obama only got where he is because of affirmative action.
Incertus
Is there an inverse relationship between the quality of an Obama appointee and the intellect of the people who are attacking her? Sure seems to be.
Violet
It’s Wingnut Buzzword Bingo. Commie! Affirmative Action! Quotas! Reverse Racism! Ivy League!
Bingo!
It’s hilariously comical, sad, and stupidly predictable all at the same time. I don’t think one arm of the conservative Wingnut party knows what the other arm of the Republican Reaginisgod party is saying or doing. They just spout buzzwords and hope something sticks.
Jay B.
She doesn’t have stock ‘assets’. She has a condo in the Village (north of $1 million for sure) and a vested pension that Brad DeLong pegs at $2.5 million.
But what does ANY of this matter? What a world.
Martin
Sonia is probably making the least per year that she will earn in her lifetime. Her income may not go up by much, but it will never go down, and she will never need to pay for any of the catastrophic expenses that most of us have to worry about.
If there’s ever been a valid disincentive toward savings, that’s it right there.
Phoenix Woman
Oh, and that quote of Sotomayor’s they keep waving around? Stuart Taylor ripped it massively out of context.
Conservatives speak, Media eats it up without comment, much less question.
Bubblegum Tate
Hooray for Spaceballs references!
MikeJ
In absolute terms it will never go down, but who knows when she’ll get raises in the future. It’s sad that judges on the highest court in the land make barely more than first year associates who haven’t even passed the bar yet.
me
I see… Dick Cheney isn’t Darth Vader, he’s Dark Helmet. That explains a lot.
Dennis-SGMM
Yeah, Karl Rove:
The Bush administration was an inverse meritocracy; Karl Rove, Condi Rice, Alberto Gonzales, Harriet Miers, Donald Rumsfeld, Lawrence Lindsay, Paul Wolfowitz.
John Cole
@MikeJ: She could quit her job any day of the week, call a firm, and make 1-5 million a year. And that only becomes more true once she is a Supreme Court Justice.
Of course, she will probably never do that.
MikeJ
No doubt. But she shouldn’t have to. I don’t expect the government to directly compete on salary with the private sector, but it would be nice if they were in the same state as the ballpark.
Comrade Jake
I, for one, am not surprised that Rove knows lots of stupid people period. In fact, I’d hazard to guess that Rove has lots of friends who are stupid people. Perhaps all of them.
Indylib
OT Via TPM Sestak says he’s going to run against Specter in the primary.
demkat620
I just wanna know, where can I get my “Supreme Court the Lunchbox.”
Between Monty Python and Mel Brooks you can pretty much explain all of life.
Blue Neponset
My guess is a judge works a hell of a lot less than a big firm attorney. The few big time lawyers I know only go home to sleep. I pity them.
Anyone know what kind of hours a judge puts in each week?
different church-lady
I’m pretty sure the new GOP strategy has been simplified to the following:
1) Say something so mind-numbingly, jaw droppingly stupid and counter to all common sense that the opposition’s head explodes.
Kind of a political-strategist version of the Chewbaca Defense.
Anne Laurie
Not a bug, but a feature. The Permanent GOP picked Steele as the hapless token who could be scapegoated for everything that goes badly for the Rethugs during his tenure. And if due to some cascade of miracles things improve for the GOP over the next year or so, Steele’s not strong enough (doesn’t have enough of a ‘base’ within the Base) to capitalize on it and improve his own political fortunes by campaigning for higher office. I think the relevant reference would be “The Spook Who Sat By the Door”…
Kathy in St. Louis
God, a “man”, well a sort of man, who worked for W for 8 years leads with a line like, “I know lots of stupid people who went to Ivy League Schools.” Well, Karl, off the top of my head, I can name one. Are we thinking of the same guy…say one who got into Yale on the oldest affirmative action program in the country….the legacy program?
TenguPhule
“I said fire across her nose, not up it!”
gwangung
@gnomedad: Exactly what I was suggesting….sorry, folks, long day and I was headed out the door when I rapped that out.
It’s just a STUPID line of reasoning. We’re not just talking about brothers, sisters, mom…we’re talking aunts, uncles, cousins, second cousins who she might be helping financially. You know, REAL family values? (And we KNOW she has at least two real nephews here. And she’s not playing Auntie Sophie to them and spoiling them rotten? Gimme a break!)
AkaDad
Never put your spin machine on ludicrous speed.
chopper
christ. i live in nyc and my wife and i make a little less than she does. and we have less in savings.
and we certainly don’t have a sweet condo in the village.
christ, people have no idea how much it actually costs to live in new york.
WingNutz
Grandmas rule over academia. I always wrote that on my papers but got bad grades for it.
Kathy in St. Louis
A million dollar condo in Greenwich Village ain’t much. Now a million dollar condo in St. Louis, Missouri, is a big deal. A million dollar condo in K.C. is a big deal, a million dollar condo in Chicago is very nice, but no big deal. A million dollar condo in the Village is probably 2 bedrooms, 2 baths and a parking space, if she’s lucky. Look online and check it out. Jesus, a sandwich and coffee for lunch in Manhattan is $25.00 with the tip. And the a##holes who are writing this stuff to denigrate this lady have all been to NYC and know better. They’re just counting on the fact that most of the people who are getting all incensed over this seldom leave their trailers, except to go to the casino or to bible study.
me
Steele must be thinking “I’m surrounded by assholes.”
gex
Ooh! The Republican’s true colors are really coming out on this one. First, they lose their shit because maybe a gay person might be nominated. Then they argue, pre-nominee that any minority or female candidate would be accepting a non-qualified candidate in lieu of a (white male) qualified candidate.
But now, the final piece. She hasn’t accumulated massive amounts of wealth. Obviously, that completes the trifecta (gogolfecta?) of demographic groups that they automatically consider to be lesser beings, lucky to be allowed to lick their boots.
The Cat Who Would Be Tunch
@chopper:
Considering the sources of many of Sotomayor’s criticisms, I find that hard to believe. In this case, we have a Harvard economist that doesn’t seem to have rudimentary knowledge of the cost of living in the financial center of the world. And this is after living in various cities on the east coast?
HumboldtBlue
He didn’t. Before he finished his senior year he was a full-time employee of the man who ran the National Republican Party, a man who introduced him to his influential friends and of course, his family. The man who hired Rove (because of the work he did fucking a duly elected College Republican President out of office by using the dirtiest tricks in the book at that time) was George Herbert Walker Bush.
gex
So let me get this straight.
Mankiw’s speaks on this with a level of authority because of his field and his past involvement in government.
So he publishes a criticism of the nominee. Well, not his criticism, but his grandmother’s criticism. Check that, it’s his dead grandmother’s criticism that he put in her mouth. So really they are his words. Only the words that he actually says run counter to what he has said in the field of his expertise. So it’s not a criticism and not what he thinks. It’s just some shit he typed in, like any 4chan jerkoff might write.
Kathy in St. Louis
I love the fact that Karl, when writing about himself as a teenager, refers to himself as a real nerd. Reall, Karl, you didn’t even have to go there. When you said you carried a briefcase to high school, I felt as if I had been there holding the door for you. That you claim to have worn a pocket protector is not news. I can forgive you lots of things, Karl. I can forgive your pomposity, self-importance, effiminate ways, the need for mansierre, or whatever they call those bras designed for men like you….I can forgive you anything but managing John Ashcroft’s Senate Race. That’s just a little too slimy for me.
eric
OT….really need help here…..for a LONG time i have been looking for the video of the BEST SNL skit of all time, but cannot find it anywhere….it is the clarence thomas confirmation hearing…does anyone have it? thanks in advance!!
eric
YellowJournalism
Rove is just grumpy because he got his Schwartz all twisted up again.
Screw that. I want my “Supreme Court the Flamethrower.”
Jamey
I think we should listen Rove. He knows THE math.
lamh31
Okay guys,
Just thinking again, but this Supreme Court Roll-out could not have been timed better. What were people talking about before this?
1. Nancy Pelois calling CIA liars.
2. Senator Dems voted en masse against Gitmo funding.
These stories were the talk of the weekend…NOT ANYMORE!!!
Damn You Barack Obama…!!!
This is like the Kennedy, Edwards, & Gore rollouts during the primaries and general.
Obama admin is playing hardball ya’ll.
El Cid
I hope that soon the RNC formally nominates the Warner Brothers Tasmanian Devil as official strategist and spokesbabbler.
gwangung
@El Cid: You really want that? That means they’d be stepping up their game…
TenguPhule
“Keep firing, assholes!”
rikyrah
Phi Beta Kappa from Princeton…
and have the nerve to cast aspersions on her intelligence.
uh huh.
they are who we think they are.
wrb
You and Rump aren’t the same?
News to me.
Yours are the two blogs I read when looking for sanity combined with wit. At least occasionally. Which is an achievement.
I rarely am able to differentiate between you two.
And by the way- why didn’t you post my pictures of Goats Gone Gault?
They are way better than the ones of house cats.
Collective forms:
A Murder of Crows
A Sack of Cats
patrick
Someone with a lifetime appointment with earnings of $179,500/yr (and increasing), federal health insurance, and a guaranteed federal retirement after that has different savings priorities than most of us
Comrade Darkness
most of the people who are getting all incensed over this seldom leave their trailers, except to go to the casino or to bible study.
Or both. It’s called bingo night.
DougJ
Don’t you mean *Chairman* Tom “Nuke Mecca” Tancredo?
Phoenician in a time of Romans
The funny thing about this is that despite all his faults, Steele has, for the most part, seen all the landmines his wingnut cohorts are tap-dancing through, but can’t do anything about it. And what makes that even funnier is that Michael Steele will be the one blamed for the GOP fail in 2010, when there was, quite literally, nothing he could do.
Lie down with dogs, wake up with your leg chewed off.
RememberNovember
@Rick Taylor:
I highly recommend everyone watch Mike Judge’s Idiocracy. That’s what we would have had if Palin made it to 1600 Penn.
Of course Rove knew a lot of stupid people at Ivy league schools, they became his coworkers. May be true except for Cornell- anyone can get in but the fail to grad ratio is higher than Yale or Harvard.
RememberNovember
@lamh31:
Obama’s got the screen pass down. He’s a baller.
Original Lee
Yesterday morning, I happened to turn on C-SPAN, and they were replaying a talk Steele gave at a D.C. high school early this month. I missed most of it, but did see the bit where he was talking about having been expelled from Johns Hopkins. He made quite a lot of sense, actually, but I think he drew the wrong conclusion from his story (unless I missed something from earlier in the talk), and I think that that is part of his problem. He seems to be able to see what the big picture is, but even with wingnut logic, the conclusions he claims to draw from it don’t quite connect up. This may be why he’s having more problems than you would expect from certain elements of the GOP.
tam1MI
::I hope that soon the RNC formally nominates the Warner Brothers Tasmanian Devil as official strategist and spokesbabbler.::
Yakety Schmakety! ;)