Why Right Wing Claims of Sotomayor's Racism Ring Hollow
Columnist Bob Herbert had an excellent article in yesterday's New York Times about the right wing's reaction to the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor. You may have heard that people like Karl Rove and Newt Gingrich have called the first Latina nominated for the Supreme Court racist.
In response, Herbert makes the excellent point that all of a sudden "these hideously pompous and self-righteous white males of the right are all concerned about racism."
They’re so concerned that they’re fully capable of finding it in places where it doesn’t for a moment exist. Not just finding it, but being outraged by it to the point of apoplexy. Oh, they tell us, this racism is a bad thing!
Herbert also uses the article to comment on Karl Rove's questioning of Judge Sotomayor's intelligence:
Karl Rove sneered that Ms. Sotomayor was “not necessarily” smart, thus managing to get the toxic issue of intelligence into play in the case of a woman who graduated summa cum laude from Princeton, went on to get a law degree from Yale and has more experience as a judge than any of the current justices had at the time of their nominations to the court.
It turns the stomach. There is no level of achievement sufficient to escape the stultifying bonds of bigotry. It is impossible to be smart enough or accomplished enough.
Ain't that right!
It continues to astound me how these guys have no clue how lame they sound. They are so confounded by having a black man in the White House they simply can't stand it--and I love that!
Check out the entire article on the New York Times website.
