Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Real Life Guts and Common Sense

Good Morning Bloggers! Jonathan Turley on MSNBC this morning said that President Barack Obama's new choice for the Supreme Court, New York jurist Sonia Sotomayor, is considered an "intellectual lightweight" by most "intellectual court observers." I don't know what to say about that point, but I will say that I was struck by the speeches this morning.

Her story is the quintessential American story, and it begs the question whether having a little more humanity on the court is more important right now than one more brilliant jurist. President Obama obviously thinks so, and he's an excellent legal scholar. I think I'll go with his expertise and ignore the talking-heads for now. It seems like a good choice to me.

The idea of our first Hispanic justice is also very exciting. Her "common touch and a sense of compassion" seem like excellent qualities for a person who is meant to judge our laws and our lives. Republicans may not understand the emotion, but I agree with the president - empathy is a very good quality when it comes to judging others. So far, I'm a big fan of the 54-year-old Sotomayor. I guess we'll all have to wait and see how it unfolds over the summer. For now, I'm very happy! I'll write more about it later.

Tuesday's Political Rave - Michael

3 comments:

jonguttman said...

Michael,

If Turley considers Princeton and Yale as breeding grounds for "intellectual lightweights" than I'm all for "intellectual lightweights".

I know I'm a bit of an academic snob, but seriously what the F is he talking about.

I think she's going to be an extraordinary choice.

Michael Boh said...

I agree Jon - her academic cred seems very impressive to me too! I like Jonathan Turley, but I think he's being a little hard on her too.

Infidel753 said...

I suppose the right-wingers would rather have someone from that fake "law school" of Pat Robertson's that produced Monica Goodling and so many of Bush's other federal appointees.....