Sotomayor “Wise Woman” Comment Part of a Pattern

From CQ Politics:

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor delivered multiple speeches between 1994 and 2003 in which she suggested “a wise Latina woman” or “wise woman” judge might “reach a better conclusion” than a male judge.

Those speeches, released Thursday as part of Sotomayor’s responses to the Senate Judiciary Committee’s questionnaire, (to see Sotomayor’s responses to the Senate Judiciary Committee click here and here) suggest her widely quoted 2001 speech in which she indicated a “wise Latina” judge might make a better decision was far from a single isolated instance.

A draft version of a October 2003 speech Sotomayor delivered at Seton Hall University stated, “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would, more often than not, reach a better conclusion.” That is identical to her October 2001 remarks at the University of California, Berkeley that have become the subject of intense criticism by Republican senators and prompted conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh to label her “racist.”

In addition, Sotomayor delivered a series of earlier speeches in which she said “a wise woman” would reach a better decision. She delivered the first of those speeches in Puerto Rico in 1994 and then before the Women’s Bar Association of the State of New York in April 1999.

The summary descriptions of speeches Sotomayor provided indicated she delivered remarks similar to the 1994 speech on three other occasions in 1999 and 2000 during two addresses at Yale and one at the City University of New York School of Law.

Her repeated use of the phrases “wise Latina woman” and “wise woman” would appear to undermine the Obama administration’s assertions that the statement was simply a poor choice of words. After details of the 1994 speech circulated before the questionnaire’s release, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, emerged from his private meeting with Sotomayor and expressed new concerns about the nominee’s “identity politics.”

Was we have observed, the idea that Sotomayor is a racist and sexist is easy to believe, given that this sort of racism and sexism is entirely routine in academia, among minority activists, Democratic politicos, feminists and a large part of the media.

Indeed, given her liberal views, it would be odd if she were not a racist and sexist.

Sonia Sotomayor: Quota Queen

From Patrick J. Buchanan:

If the U.S. Senate rejects race-based justice, Sonia Sotomayor will never sit on the Supreme Court. Because that is what Sonia is all about. As the New York Times reported Saturday, the salient cause of her career has been advancing persons of color, over whites, based on race and national origin. “Judge Sotomayor, whose parents moved to New York from Puerto Rico,” writes reporter David Kirkpatrick, “has championed the importance of considering race and ethnicity in admissions, hiring and even judicial selection at almost every stage of her career.” At Princeton, she headed up Accion Puertorriquena, which filed a complaint with the Department of Health, Education and Welfare demanding that her school hire Hispanic teachers. At Yale, she co-chaired a coalition of non-black minorities of color that demanded more Latino professors and administrators.

At Yale, she “shared the alarm of others in the group when the Supreme Court prohibited the use of quotas in university admissions in the 1978 decision Regents of the University of California v. Bakke.” Alan Bakke was an applicant to the UC medical school at Davis who was rejected, though his test scores were higher than almost all of the minority students who were admitted. Bakke was white. After Yale, Sotomayor joined the National Council of La Raza and the board of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund. Both promote race and ethnic preferences, affirmative action and quotas for Hispanics. But why should Puerto Ricans like Sotomayor, who were never subjected to slavery or Jim Crow—their island was liberated from Spain in 1898 by the United States—get racial or ethnic preferences over Polish- or Portuguese-Americans?

What is the justification for this kind of discrimination?

Like Lani Guinier, the Clinton appointee rejected for reverse racism, Sonia Sotomayor is a quota queen. She believes in, preaches and practices race-based justice. Her burying the appeal of the white New Haven firefighters, who were denied promotions they had won in competitive exams, was a no-brainer for her. In her world, equal justice takes a back seat to tribal justice.

Thus, there is little reason to think that Sotomayor somehow “misspoke” when she uttered her now famous statement:

“I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”

That’s not merely acceptable, but virtually unquestioned in the politically-correct sectors of society where Sotomayor has spent her life. Among college professors, Democratic political activists, in elite law schools and minority activist organizations, that’s just the way one is supposed to think.

Sex Discrimination in State Government: No Males Need Apply

From the State of Wisconsin Legislative Reference Bureau, a letter advertising an internship.

The catch, it’s for women only. No men need apply.

If some male should apply, and be turned down for being male, he could almost certainly sue.

As much as the left might dislike it, the Civil Rights laws protect whites as well as blacks, and men as well as women.

The City of Milwaukee found this out when white police officers, discriminated against because of their race, won a large jury award.

More Diversity Follies in Chicago

Thomas Evoy has become, virtually, our regular correspondent on the absurdity that is Chicago city government, and he sends this along:

Here’s a fun story-one of the Cook County commissioners wants to ensure that the public prosocuter’s office is racially balanced:

Beavers slams hiring in prosecutor’s office

Never mind the competition from PC law firms, get out there and hire! And hire for a job that’s probably pretty unpopular with minority “victims,” being the man and putting it to the downtrodden!

I have to wonder what’s next. We’d like to hire the most qualified doctor, but were already over budget on whites, hispanics and asians so everyone who needs brain surgery will have to wait until we find a black brain surgeon who wants to work for low wages at County Hospital. Will we need racially balanced garbage crews, tree trimmers, sewer workers and road crews?

The Cook County commissioner who’s making that absurd demand is the same one who tried to get his daughter elected as a Chicago alderman to follow him-she lost to Mrs. Jesse Jackson Jr.

Apart from that, in the “bad timing” department one of the Illinois courts handed down a soverign immunity decsion yesterday in a case about a porch collapse two or three years ago. Not too unusual except for the timing with the bridge collapse: and also the disclosures (after the porch came down) that Chicago had hired the 19 year-old son of a politically connected carpenter as a building inspector (with the excuse that he knew about buildings as the son & grandson of carpenters) and that some porch inspections were taking something like 10 minutes for a three-story structure serving six apartments.

Here’s a little bit from the Sun-Times GOSSIP columnist that I didn’t see before: the term “Superblack” as well as the idea that his own kid is already pulling down $70k/year.

“The hitch: Beavers may have a point! Turns out his own son, David, landed a plum job in that office as a $70,000-a-year investigator and is among the highest-paid employees in the state’s attorney’s capital litigation program!”

Shock: Civil Rights Law Protects Whites

When Congress passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, it was explicit that it protected whites as well as blacks, and men as well as women (although in that pre-feminist era, nobody was paying much attention to the gender aspect).

The Act, remember, had opponents. Some were simply racists (or pandering to racists, which is worse). But some, like Barry Goldwater, had a principled fear about handing such powers over to the Federal government.

The opponents said that the Act might lead to racial quotas, or to “reverse discrimination.” The proponents of the Act made it clear that those things would be impossible. They insisted that any discrimination against whites would be outlawed just as any discrimination against blacks would be.

Of course, the proponents of “civil rights” quickly moved to discriminate against whites, and institute de facto quotas. But the Act (and other civil rights laws) remains what it is.

From the Journal-Sentinel:

The city would pay $2.65 million to 17 current and former Milwaukee police lieutenants who successfully argued they were passed over for promotion because they were white men, under a settlement backed Monday by a Common Council committee.

If the full council agrees July 31, each of the men would be paid $103,922 to end their federal discrimination lawsuit against former Police Chief Arthur Jones and the Fire and Police Commission. Their attorney, William Rettko, would be paid $833,333, nearly one-third of the total.

The lieutenants filed suit in 2003, accusing the city’s first permanent black police chief of discriminating against them by repeatedly promoting minority and female officers ahead of them. During Jones’ tenure, about 80% of Milwaukee police lieutenants were white men, but about half the 41 people he promoted to captain were minorities or women.

In their suit, the lieutenants sought $300,000 each, or $5.1 million, in addition to unspecified punitive damages.

A federal jury ruled in their favor in 2005, finding that between them, the officers were discriminated against a total of 144 times. The jury and U.S. District Judge Thomas J. Curran awarded $3.7 million in damages. Curran later awarded attorney’s fees that brought the total to about $4.6 million, Deputy City Attorney Rudolph Konrad said in a memo to the council’s Judiciary and Legislation Committee.

In January of this year, a federal appeals court upheld the verdict but sent the damages back to the district court in Milwaukee to be recalculated. Both sides agreed to mediation, which produced Monday’s deal, said Assistant City Attorney Miriam Horwitz.

We would strongly urge white males who think they have been victims of discrimination to go to court and sue. Make life dangerous for those who discriminate.