Posted on 06/06/2009 7:04:40 AM PDT by subaru
WASHINGTON -- U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, in the Republican Party's weekly message, said today that confirmation hearings of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor will be respectful, but he also warned that any evidence her personal history would shape her decision-making will be challenged forcefully. "Although we sometimes take our heritage of neutral and independent judiciary for granted, the truth is, this great tradition is under attack. And the American people are rightly concerned," Sessions said in the GOP address distributed nationally as a counterpoint to President Barack Obama's weekly address. ... In his remarks, Sessions maintained his cordial approach to the hearings, promising Sotomayor ample opportunity to respond to any criticisms and an avoidance of "political theater" and character distortions.
But he also escalated his criticism of Obama, and by extension, Sotomayor, saying judges who display empathy are endangering the American judicial system. Obama has said that empathy, or "understanding and identifying with people's hopes and struggles" is an essential ingredient for judges. ... "I fear that this 'empathy standard' is another step down the path to a cynical, relativistic, results-oriented world where words and laws have no fixed meaning; where unelected judges set policy; and where Constitutional limits on government power are ignored when they are inconvenient to the powerful," Sessions said.
He asked the American people to engage in the debate by asking, "Do I want a judge that allows his or her social, political, or religious views to impact the outcome? Or, do I want a judge that objectively applies the law to the facts, and fairly rules on the merits?"
"That is the central question around which this entire nomination process will revolve," Sessions said.
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.al.com ...
Good for Sessions. Better than Cornyn refusing to call a racist a racist.
Keep an eye on Jeff though. In the end he may pull a Hatch as will many other Republicrats.
You mean Sessions has actually stuck his nose out from under his desk??!! Perhaps he’ll do more at the hearings than heap praise on this thoroughly unqualified “justice” for the mere fact of her existence!
You'll never see Dick Durbin or the arch-traitor Leahy tripping over "courtesy".
If judges rule that the law says something other than what the direct words of the law say, then the people can never know what the law governing any issue actually mean.
It is the equivalent of being ruled by secret laws that nobody other than the judges are allowed to read. IOW, something other than a Constitutional Republic.
Following is an excerpt (in the interest of not committing a crime against humanity, I've not shown the whole gag-inducing statement).
She appears girlishly giddy that Democrats are acknowledging her existence. A pat on the head, and she's theirs. Ooh, she was personally informed by Rahm Emanuel. I don't think she's an exception.
Snowe Statement on Meeting with Supreme Court Nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor
June 3, 2009
Last month, Senator Snowe urged President Obama to nominate a woman during a private meeting in the Oval Office and then followed up on the suggestion with a letter jointly signed by Senator Barbara Boxer. White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel called Senator Snowe to personally inform the Senator of the President’s decision to nominate Judge Sotomayor to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court prior to the official announcement last Tuesday.
“Oh, tough guy, eh?”
If I never heard from one of these...Senators again, it would be too soon.
Much like secure credit, that isn't. It's a great way to creat a compliant population: do what we say or we'll find a law to reinterpret so you're guilty.
The Honorable Senator Jeff Sessions: great American.
So envious of you Alabama, so very envious.
Never underestimate Jeff Sessions
It looks as though the Senator plans to frame the issue around Obama’s philosophy in picking her.
Rush made that point, saying use the process to show who Obama really is.
I like this.
Let me second that.
U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, in the Republican Party's weekly message, said today that confirmation hearings of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor will be respectful, but he also warned that any evidence her personal history would shape her decision-making will be challenged forcefully. "Although we sometimes take our heritage of neutral and independent judiciary for granted, the truth is, this great tradition is under attack. And the American people are rightly concerned,"
There’s more than Senatorial Courtesy at work with Cornyn.
Cornyn was a judge in Texas before running for Senate.
Those two things:
Judicial temperament and Texas manners...
Keep Cornyn in line as much or more than does the Senate.
I like Sessions approach better...he would never step over that line, either, but neither would he attack Rush as Cornyn did by implication.
Sessions will do it his way and leave the other ways alone.
His way is to put much more focus on Obama than Sotomayor and on the dangerous philosophy behind the pick.
It is the equivalent of being ruled by secret laws that nobody other than the judges are allowed to read. IOW, something other than a Constitutional Republic.
Hear, hear! Worth repeating! Very well said!
I don't think the constituents of the dhims' on the Judiciary Committee are going to take too kindly to this Obamanomination if your framing of Activist SotomayOR becomes properly repeated everywhere.
She's a walking, talking, writing "I'll be able to do you (non-white, LaRaza-types) corrupt favors by ruling in your favor irrespective of what any of the law says, whenever my Latina-valued empathy kicks in."
HF
I remember..................
Senator Edward Kennedy — “Robert Bork's America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, children could not be taught about evolution.”
One does wonder whatever value Sotomayor got out of that considering that she married a non-Latin guy (Kevin Edward Noonan) who dumped her after 7 years of marriage ~ she never remarried.
(Whoops~! There I've gone and done it ~ called into question her very "Latin-ness" ~ well, that had to come out anyway. Woman had a chance to take on any number of Latin lovers and she picked a guy named Noonan ~ wow!)
If you repeat it, pleasew correct my grammatical error, as below:
If judges rule that the law says something other than what the direct words of the law say, then the people can never know what the law governing any issue actually means.
It is the equivalent of being ruled by secret laws that nobody other than the judges are allowed to read. IOW, something other than a Constitutional Republic.
Here is an article attacking Sessions. I rather like his comment.
‘Enough with the histrionics.’ “
Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama was openly disdainful of a 12-year-old boy who wept throughout a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing this week on the Uniting American Families Act, which would give equal citizenship rights to the foreign-born same-sex partners of American citizens. Sessions opposes the bill.
The committee was hearing from Shirley Tan, a Filipino woman who had fled her country after being physically attacked by a man who had killed her mother and sister. Tan and her American partner of 23 years are raising 12-year-old twin sons here, but she was almost deported in April, and has been granted only a temporary reprieve.
As Tan began to speak, one of her sons, who was seated behind her, began to cry, and Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy stopped the hearing to inquire whether the child was alright, and whether he might not prefer to sit in a private room. But according to the New Republic, the 12-year-old’s tears only annoyed Sessions, who “leaned towards one of his aides and sighed, ‘Enough with the histrionics.’ “
Which was a little out there even for Sessions, who enlivens most of the hearings he takes part in by refusing to hide his temper or temper his impatience; no one can say he’s not authentic. The committee he now sits on voted down his appointment by Ronald Reagan to a federal judgeship in 1986, chiefly on allegations that he had made racially insensitive comments.
He also gave the weekly radio address for his party this morning – and expressed concerns about President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor: “I am troubled by President Obama’s use of the ‘empathy standard’ when selecting federal judges.’’ In other words, enough already?
I will NEVER forget that! V’s wife.
Sessions: “the American people are rightly concerned” about Sotomayor
That’s good he’s got that idea hmm.
This is exactly the right tact to take. Personal attacks on Sotomayer are not necessarily helpful or wise. My guess is that they assume it is highly unlikely they can keep Sotomayer from being confirmed, so we can and should make this all about Obama’s flawed vision of judicial philosophy. Make it about Obama's assault on our constitution and the rule of law. Make people aware of the danger of allowing other judicial activists on to the Supreme Court bench. If we can raise awareness and criticism over Obama's attack on judicial neutrality and independence, it may make a difference in electing more conservatives in 2010 and stopping Obama’s reelection in 2012
#####
Go Senator Sessions! Tell it like it is!!!!
Libs excuse themselves for ignoring the Law by claiming that 'rich and/or rascally republicans have always done it to us.'
ROFL!
Senator Snowe urged President Obama to nominate a woman during a private meeting in the Oval Office and then followed up on the suggestion with a letter jointly signed by Senator Barbara Boxer.
Oh, so this was all Snowe's idea after all? Boxer just came along for the ride? Another self-absorbed RINO. God help us.
For a non-Latino woman, she's stuffed chock full of wisdom and sound judgment.
Why, when I saw her march the parade route here in Bangor on the Fourth of July wearing high heels I said to myself, "Now there's a woman I'd follow into the bowels of hell!"
“Part of the Latina woman’s environment is the world of the Machismo male. He beats her regularly whether she needs it or not.”
WTF kind of racist comment is that? Your entire post is idiotic. I really hope it is sarcasm, and not your true understanding of Latina culture. I am embarrassed for you.
That's like the silly female undergrads on campus dashing around on their stilettos. They make their own glass ceilings.
The only woman to pull it off appropriately, and with great style, was Jackie Kennedy as she followed Jack's coffin.
My favorite senator.
“.......he beats her regularly........”
There’s a lot of truth in that statement. I was a Paramedic in the Houston area for a number of years working on a volunteer ambulance service. You wouldn’t believe the number of calls we had for victems of domestic violence in Hispanic households. It got so bad that I wouldn’t go in untill the Sheriff’s Dept. had secured the scene with the perp in cuffs in the back seat in the Deputy’s car (If the perp was still there).
It’s much more common in the Hispanic community. And it is a cultural thing.
It isn’t a cultural thing. I respond to domestic violence calls in all kinds of households. Mostly they are in poor areas, which may be the Hispanic correlation. I am a Hispanic male, born and raised in Puerto Rico. I can tell you honestly that there is no acceptance for beating women in the Hispanic community.
Hispanic people by nature are conservative. When talking to them, they overwhelmingly agree with conservative principles of government. Yet, they vote Democratic in large numbers. I have recommended to friends that they explore conservative political ideas at FR. At first they are excited to find a forum such as this where they feel they can learn more about conservative thinking. Then, they come across some of the Latina/Hispanic posts and they are completely turned off. This is a perfect example of why.
This kind of thinking does nothing but ensure that Democrats will continue to remain in power, and continue their destruction of our country. Hispanics are just like those of any other race. There is good and there is bad. Attributing wife beating to Hispanic culture is judging an entire group of people based upon the acts of a few.
I was just reporting on my personal experience “on the ground”. It’s true that this experience was obtained in very poor areas and should have been included in my post.
Lots of talk, I want to see them actually push the matter.
She is unfit because of her views and her decisions made in the past.
We need to get past this race card that this administration pulls too often.
Thanks for your response. I didn’t mean to go off on you like that. I am a bit sensitive to these things. Not for personal reasons. I have heard it all and it doesn’t bother me. What upsets me is that Hispanics make up 13% of the US population now, and have a much higher birth rate than non-Hispanics. Yet, they vote Democrat because they perceive that the GOP is hostile to them. This is in spite of the fact that they agree with their political ideas. It doesn’t make for a good future.
Back to Sessions (don’t want to hijack the thread) I hope he is serious. I won’t believe it until I see him ask her the hard questions during confirmation, and vote against her.
“Judicial temperament and Texas manners...”
Fair enough, but as I myself too am from the Great State of Texas, telling the truth is neither intemperate, nor rude. My only point is that I would thank him to understand as much. He was out of his place to say anything about anyone deciding to call a duck a duck. Just because he was controlled by either that lack of testicular fortitude or by political correctness does not mean others should be castrated as well.
Sessions never got the memo about “compassionate conservatism.” Heh.
Sounds like "Snowe Job" would be a more accurate title.
Leni
Senator Edward Kennedy — “Robert Bork’s America is a land in which women would be forced into back-alley abortions, blacks would sit at segregated lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, children could not be taught about evolution.”
“Sotomaor’s America is a land in which men would be second class citizens, whites would have no place at the lunch counters, rogue police could break down citizens’ doors in midnight raids, children could not be taught about American history.”
The best offense is to use their words against them. Throw their own nasty, hateful words in their faces. When they complain, enlighten them to their own ways.
Good job. Now stick to it.
She's not up for re-election until 2012, but she's suddenly my bestest friend in the whole wide world despite not acknowledging any communication from me since I wrote a three-page letter to her via snail mail castigating her during the Clinton impeachment.
I think maybe her internal polling may be giving her pause.
I can only hope.
The pubs are wetting their fingers and holding them into the air.
At first, as is their wont, they all demurred that but of course they would not give the fine, fine Sotomayor any grief, goodness....they do not wish to offend their friends across the aisle. and of course they do not wish to muss perfectly placed head hairs or get out of the tanning booth.
But little by little the past of Sotomayor crops up and it’s damning. the American people, God love them, don’t have the longest attention span in the world but they believe in fair. Many of our own children are white male, not Latina females....ie offspring of us....we fools out here in la-la land who carry this country on our backs.
That Ricci case and this woman’s insistance over and over that she is somehow better than a white male just won’t go over well with the American people.
For a Hispanic nominee is fine and dandy for a politician. Politicians look for votes, massive demographics that will bring in votes to keep them in power. Ordinary Americans looks for fairness and while we’ve long ago, never mind that silly Garafolo woman, don’t believe that folks should be discriminated for their skin color, heritage, religion, etc. But this discrimination ALSO INCLUDES WHITE PEOPLE!
Heh. That’s where ordinary folk differ from the politician. We don’t want ANYONE discriminated against. Politicians want those who do not benefit them to be punished greatly.
So hey, Sotomayor might be beloved by the politicians but she ain’t going to fly all that well by the average joe out here in la-la land.
The pubs, they spend entirely too much time in DC, reaching across the aisle to their “friends” and hoping their mailboxes are filled with cocktail party invites.
Thus it might take them a while to get a clue and there’s their natural aversion to having head hairs move from their appointed places and goodness we must have time for the tanning booths.
Sessions seems like a mostly good guy but he’s got the rest of the RINOS on his hide. However, the tide of public opinion is changing and for these guys sometimes they need to be absolutely sure that they won’t scrape polished nails or make their Dem friends mad at them.
Another point: the principles of sportsmanship dictate that a baseball manager must be willing to accept bad calls from the home plate umpire, but there are limits. If the home plate umpire were to call "strike" on nine consecutive pitches which were rolled to the catcher, and then "ball" on sixteen consecutive right-down-the-middle pitches thrown by the other team, not only would sportsmanship no longer dictate that the managers continue to accept such calls; good sportsmanship would require that the manager (and anyone else with power to do so) refuse to allow the game to appear in any way legitimate. The best outcome would probably be for the official in charge of weather to call the game "rained out and incapable of being continued", even if the sky is clear and sunny. Otherwise, the manager of the victimized team should forfeit the game and publicly announce why. Let sports fans keep their own record of what they think the result is.
There isn't any rule or procedure for dealing with a home-plate umpire who makes so many patently unreasonable calls that the game cannot be continued in sane fashion, because any such rule would introduce its own ambiguities. Nonetheless, the lack of such a rule doesn't mean that a good sportsman shouldn't go outside what the official rules allow in cases where the official rules have essentially become meaningless. Note that a suggestion that teams should go outside the rules in such cases isn't an invitation to anarchy. Rather, it is an acknowledgment that if anarchy already exists, having people make their own rulings in accordance with what the official rules required the umpire to make will be less detrimental to the game's legitimacy than having an official make rulings in wanton disregard to what rules actually say.
The practice is sufficiently widespread to have drawn the attention of the police.
It's the culture man ~
Sen. Sessions is correct, but this is just part of a long trend in the wrong direction. The truth is that this great tradition has been under attack for decades, as most anyone who regularly attends courtroom proceedings at any level will probably attest.
Very true. It really got going with the smearing of Robert Bork in 1987, though there had been a few before that.
We aren't dealing with peers here, people. Democrats don't act or think like rational, patriotic men. To a man and woman, they are sociopathic egomaniacs whose only concern is the acquisition and retention of personal power.
Memorize that every time you hear a Republican speak of Democrats as though they were equals, with fairness and America's best interests at heart.
This bad trend in naming judges started with the likes of Joe Biden, Chuck Schumer and Ted Kennedy and the GOP has just rolled over and played dead when it came to appointing people like Ginsberg.
Now when conservatives criticize an Obama candidate, we become natural racists, prejudiced against Latinos, and the MSM cranks out propaganda.
We need a widely read and televised conservative media.
Republicans should be preventing this conformation AT ALL COSTS.
Next thing we know, we will have fiats from the bench making Spanish the official language of the USA.Don't laugh. It happened in Canada with French.
When required to serve as jurors, Americans are commanded to forget their prejudices and experiences and to judge a case based solely on the evidence presented and the law. Why shouldn't judges be held to at least the same standard as ordinary citizens?
AMEN!!
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