Monday, July 6, 2009

Sonia Sotomayor and More Gratuitous Promotion of Family Members

My father has a piece up at the Oxford University Press blog arguing for the confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor. He was earlier in favor of the confirmation of Samuel Alito. He argues that the most important condition is once again satisfied: Sotomayor is a qualified legal professional.

I'm not sure I agree with his argument. Frankly. there seem to be many qualified candidates who have a great deal of experience. I personally am also deeply concerned about Sotomayor's attitude towards both free speech and civil liberties issues ( Doninger v. Niehoff being the most serious example). I worry that with her on the Court many close decisions that would otherwise support civil liberties will otherwise go in the other direction.

In any event, the piece is worth reading and raises a number of interesting points. Go read it.

7 comments:

Stacy said...

Yes, her catholicism makes me a LITTLE weary. Not too much though.

Joshua said...

I'm not sure why there would be a concern about her being a Catholic. There's no indication I can see in any of her opinions that reflect any of the official Catholic attitudes that progressives would find problematic. It is however odd that the Court has so many Catholics. It is very disproportionate compared to the general population. But with a sample of only 9 people it is hard to label it significant.

Stacy said...

That's exactly it. It doesn't concern me too much - but the sheer number of catholics is what is strange.

Shalmo said...

off topic; Joshua I have one more article I would like you to read on the Iranian elections:

http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20090622_iranian_election_and_revolution_test

Shalmo said...

sorry the whole link didn't show, here it is again:

http://www.stratfor.com/weekly/20090622_iranian_election_and_revolution_test

Shalmo said...

Argh!

Ok just click on my user-name for the link

Joshua said...

Shalmo, the article linked to like the previous article you linked to ignores the problem of serious statistical anomalies in the election data (such as problems with Benford's Law). It may very well be that Achmenijad would have won anyways but it looks probable that fraud occurred. (Also would it hurt matters if you posted follow-up comments in the relevant threads?)