Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly.
He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
than many would like, but left-liberals and liberal-progressives have yet to break the Beltway hegemony.
Until we do that we won’t get real, true alternatives to prevailing corporatist ideologies and perspectives.
As long as she votes to uphold Roe vs. Wade, I think she’ll be a wonderful justice. She appears to be fiercely independent minded which is what you need on the Supremes.
PLUS, she’s a single, divorced, Latina in her fifties, lived in the “projects” and has Type 1 Diabates.
That’s some serious change I can believe in.
I’d love to see Alito’s face when she dons her robes. After all, he was one of the knuckleheads who lobbied Princeton as an undergraduate to keep women out. I think the O-Man (copyright Field Negro) has a sense of humor.
than many would like, but left-liberals and liberal-progressives have yet to break the Beltway hegemony.
Until we do that we won’t get real, true alternatives to prevailing corporatist ideologies and perspectives.
What are the chances of the progressive left (eventtually) doing to the democrats what the fer right (and the neocons) have done to the GOP?
Well what they need to do now is criticise Sotomayor for being a right wing ideologue and really confuse the Gopers and move the Overton window so that what is considered lefist now comes to be seen as centre right. Otherwise the GOP talking points about her being a leftist, affirmative action, identity politics pick will become the dominant narrative.
Too late. Assuming she is a centrist then the GOP already won the framing game–she’s a liberal. And Obama and the centrist Dems probably have no problem pretending Sotomayor is a liberal.
We are all mocking the insane eruption from the right on Sotomayor’s nomination–and rightly so–the substance of their criticism is insane.
But, the GOP has been remarkably successful over the last 30 years in browbeating and scaring Democrats into not nominating anyone very liberal and shoving their right-wingers onto America’s benches. And polluting our discourse and our law in the process.
I don’t know yet what the truth is but I feel like I’ve seen this play before . . . like last week
The second issue is living our values and being active in our communities – especially in suburbia and small towns. Seeing that a “leftist” can coach baseball, bake yummy cookies for the PTA, goes to a “church” or synagogue (liberal and reform as they may be), babysits kids, has a kickass garden and deck, etc. shows that we all share common interests and identities.
Since so many progressives and left-liberals are highly mobile and in highly mobile professions however, this becomes a serious challenge in developing a good bench of people for dog catcher, parks commission, school board and the like. Folks in the cities should get active in neighborhood associations, park clean-ups, tutoring and mentoring programs, coach baseball, soccer, track and the like.
The third is helping “clean-cut” kids who identify as “left-liberal” secure (and afford) internships, fellowships, judicial clerkships and the like.
I like centrist better, although I’d suggest the political spectrum is more circular than linear, with authoritarianism linking the two ends of a line into a circle.
Judge Sotomayor comes out of a rich Puerto Rican tradition which contains a deep attachment to Roman Catholicism which is like death on abortion. Defenders of “Roe v. Wade” might want to check this point out before they jump on her judicial band wagon. They might get something they didn’t bargain for – the deciding vote against “Roe v. Wade”.
From the coverage of her record, she is very much like Souter – a case by case judge, with a strong sense of precedent.
If you want to see the judicial activism of the conservative wing of the court, look for Souter’s opinions when he went against them.
I think that in the same way Sotomayor will be a brake on the judicial activism of Roberts, Scalia, Alito, and Thomas.
Roe v. Wade is not the political solution to abortion rights. It’s the politics and the political settlement of this issue that will determine whether Roe v. Wade survives. And my sense is that the decriminalization of first trimester abortions will continue until that settlement occurs. So it is not the Supreme Court, it is the shape of that political settlement that abortion rights activists should be working on. And on the implications of health care reform for reshaping the debate.
And maybe we will return to old-style jurists instead of ideologues.
As a federal judge, Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor’s decisions in insurance disputes “have overwhelmingly been in favor of insurers” and against policyholders, says Philadelphia insurance lawyer Randy Maniloff, partner at White & Williams L.L.P.
“Judge Sotomayor has been very, very insurer-friendly during her time on the bench,” Maniloff told me after reviewing a long list of her cases and appeal rulings.
“Has she ever ruled in favor of a policyholder?” Maniloff asked. On Sotomayor’s docket, between insurers and their customers, “it’s insurers by a landslide,” he said.
not sure what that means for the future, but that’s a cause for some concern and reflection.
The underlying law is very friendly to insurers and against policyholders. And the appellate grounds for overturning such cases is very narrow.
The fact is what a judge gets to decide on is what comes before the court. Now there can be picking and choosing of what and when to overturn something, but most cases follow precedent. Following precedent says nothing about a judge’s personal views.
The judicial shaping of law mostly comes very slowly. The big-name cases Brown v. Board of Education, Gideon, Miranda, Roe v. Wade happen rarely.
Case decisions themselves say nothing. The arguments presented in making those decisions are more indicative of what a judge might do. You will see many of those same forms of argument later.
Very true. Especially on health care insurance policies. That’s one area where insurers get to commit what would normally be a tort–bad faith. They can simply deny someone medical coverage just because they don’t want to write a check and there would be very little remedy for the victim. Both politicians and judges have worked hard to give more power to insurance companies the last few decades.
But I disagree that insurance cases don’t involve larger issues. The average person contracting with an insurer doesn’t have the same bargaining power and sophistication and a few decades ago this was the area that judges on the left were pretty active, to use a loaded term, to use the law to balance the power of these parties and stand up for the little guy.
In fact, some of the biggest cases in California have involved insurance matters and justices definitely bring a ideology to these cases (and the ideology that has prevailed has been the free market ideology of Chicago law and economics people–as in the legislatures as well–in fact, the modern Democrats are probably equally as protective of the insurance industry as the Republicans were 30 years ago).
So, in effect, both in our legislature and courts, there may not be a better example of how the left has caved in to corporate interests and so that the little guy has very little protection. And you’re right to focus the attention to the politicians rather than the judges–but they are both culpable.
I wish that those making these charges would cite the details of the cases. If they were on appeal, the grounds for overturning them indeed would be narrow. The problem is knowing whether the little guy had a defensible case. I can’t judge one way or the other without the details. Just insurer vs. claimant doesn’t tell me anything except that insurers don’t contest claims they are likely to lose.
Insurance cases do involve larger issues, but as you point out those go to corporate vs. individual issues that are still Constitutionally weak (if apparently settled).
This whole spectacle is starting to make me sick. The Gops are right in one respect: this nomination has every appearance of another decision based more on political strategy than overriding principle. Not that that’s anything new — it’s been the standard procedure forever.
So on the one hand we get Sotomayor’s backers doing the “American dream” bullshit about her ambitious rise from poverty, which has nothing to do with her qualifications to be a judge — to be a president or legislator, yes, but not a judge.
On the other side we see the Gops making up shit about her “liberalism” and pretty openly claiming that her gender and ethnicity disqualifies her to think clearly. And now NARAL of course has to jump in to wring its hands in public and restart the cash flow to its cause.
Maybe it’s just the mists of time making everything look pretty, but it does seem like there was a day when choosing judges had some dignity involved somewhere in the process. And all for nothing. Except for the most extreme and obvious ideologs of the Scalia/Thomas/Roberts kind, nobody has any idea how a justice will come down on any issue, as witness examples like Warren, O’Connor, and Souter for starters. We need a better way of choosing members of the Court, but are stuck with yet another stink bomb planted by the founders.
than many would like, but left-liberals and liberal-progressives have yet to break the Beltway hegemony.
Until we do that we won’t get real, true alternatives to prevailing corporatist ideologies and perspectives.
As long as she votes to uphold Roe vs. Wade, I think she’ll be a wonderful justice. She appears to be fiercely independent minded which is what you need on the Supremes.
PLUS, she’s a single, divorced, Latina in her fifties, lived in the “projects” and has Type 1 Diabates.
That’s some serious change I can believe in.
I’d love to see Alito’s face when she dons her robes. After all, he was one of the knuckleheads who lobbied Princeton as an undergraduate to keep women out. I think the O-Man (copyright Field Negro) has a sense of humor.
What are the chances of the progressive left (eventtually) doing to the democrats what the fer right (and the neocons) have done to the GOP?
Well what they need to do now is criticise Sotomayor for being a right wing ideologue and really confuse the Gopers and move the Overton window so that what is considered lefist now comes to be seen as centre right. Otherwise the GOP talking points about her being a leftist, affirmative action, identity politics pick will become the dominant narrative.
Too late. Assuming she is a centrist then the GOP already won the framing game–she’s a liberal. And Obama and the centrist Dems probably have no problem pretending Sotomayor is a liberal.
We are all mocking the insane eruption from the right on Sotomayor’s nomination–and rightly so–the substance of their criticism is insane.
But, the GOP has been remarkably successful over the last 30 years in browbeating and scaring Democrats into not nominating anyone very liberal and shoving their right-wingers onto America’s benches. And polluting our discourse and our law in the process.
I don’t know yet what the truth is but I feel like I’ve seen this play before . . . like last week
A big challenge is moving the Overton window.
The second issue is living our values and being active in our communities – especially in suburbia and small towns. Seeing that a “leftist” can coach baseball, bake yummy cookies for the PTA, goes to a “church” or synagogue (liberal and reform as they may be), babysits kids, has a kickass garden and deck, etc. shows that we all share common interests and identities.
Since so many progressives and left-liberals are highly mobile and in highly mobile professions however, this becomes a serious challenge in developing a good bench of people for dog catcher, parks commission, school board and the like. Folks in the cities should get active in neighborhood associations, park clean-ups, tutoring and mentoring programs, coach baseball, soccer, track and the like.
The third is helping “clean-cut” kids who identify as “left-liberal” secure (and afford) internships, fellowships, judicial clerkships and the like.
I dislike the word moderate. Who wants a moderate when it comes to civil rights, preemptive war and torture, to name but a few issues.
I like centrist better, although I’d suggest the political spectrum is more circular than linear, with authoritarianism linking the two ends of a line into a circle.
Maybe we need a whole new diagram.
Judge Sotomayor comes out of a rich Puerto Rican tradition which contains a deep attachment to Roman Catholicism which is like death on abortion. Defenders of “Roe v. Wade” might want to check this point out before they jump on her judicial band wagon. They might get something they didn’t bargain for – the deciding vote against “Roe v. Wade”.
From the coverage of her record, she is very much like Souter – a case by case judge, with a strong sense of precedent.
If you want to see the judicial activism of the conservative wing of the court, look for Souter’s opinions when he went against them.
I think that in the same way Sotomayor will be a brake on the judicial activism of Roberts, Scalia, Alito, and Thomas.
Roe v. Wade is not the political solution to abortion rights. It’s the politics and the political settlement of this issue that will determine whether Roe v. Wade survives. And my sense is that the decriminalization of first trimester abortions will continue until that settlement occurs. So it is not the Supreme Court, it is the shape of that political settlement that abortion rights activists should be working on. And on the implications of health care reform for reshaping the debate.
And maybe we will return to old-style jurists instead of ideologues.
The WALL STREET JOURNAL likes her.
Via susie, sotomayor has a pro-insurer not pro-insured recrod:
not sure what that means for the future, but that’s a cause for some concern and reflection.
The underlying law is very friendly to insurers and against policyholders. And the appellate grounds for overturning such cases is very narrow.
The fact is what a judge gets to decide on is what comes before the court. Now there can be picking and choosing of what and when to overturn something, but most cases follow precedent. Following precedent says nothing about a judge’s personal views.
The judicial shaping of law mostly comes very slowly. The big-name cases Brown v. Board of Education, Gideon, Miranda, Roe v. Wade happen rarely.
Case decisions themselves say nothing. The arguments presented in making those decisions are more indicative of what a judge might do. You will see many of those same forms of argument later.
Very true. Especially on health care insurance policies. That’s one area where insurers get to commit what would normally be a tort–bad faith. They can simply deny someone medical coverage just because they don’t want to write a check and there would be very little remedy for the victim. Both politicians and judges have worked hard to give more power to insurance companies the last few decades.
But I disagree that insurance cases don’t involve larger issues. The average person contracting with an insurer doesn’t have the same bargaining power and sophistication and a few decades ago this was the area that judges on the left were pretty active, to use a loaded term, to use the law to balance the power of these parties and stand up for the little guy.
In fact, some of the biggest cases in California have involved insurance matters and justices definitely bring a ideology to these cases (and the ideology that has prevailed has been the free market ideology of Chicago law and economics people–as in the legislatures as well–in fact, the modern Democrats are probably equally as protective of the insurance industry as the Republicans were 30 years ago).
So, in effect, both in our legislature and courts, there may not be a better example of how the left has caved in to corporate interests and so that the little guy has very little protection. And you’re right to focus the attention to the politicians rather than the judges–but they are both culpable.
I wish that those making these charges would cite the details of the cases. If they were on appeal, the grounds for overturning them indeed would be narrow. The problem is knowing whether the little guy had a defensible case. I can’t judge one way or the other without the details. Just insurer vs. claimant doesn’t tell me anything except that insurers don’t contest claims they are likely to lose.
Insurance cases do involve larger issues, but as you point out those go to corporate vs. individual issues that are still Constitutionally weak (if apparently settled).
This whole spectacle is starting to make me sick. The Gops are right in one respect: this nomination has every appearance of another decision based more on political strategy than overriding principle. Not that that’s anything new — it’s been the standard procedure forever.
So on the one hand we get Sotomayor’s backers doing the “American dream” bullshit about her ambitious rise from poverty, which has nothing to do with her qualifications to be a judge — to be a president or legislator, yes, but not a judge.
On the other side we see the Gops making up shit about her “liberalism” and pretty openly claiming that her gender and ethnicity disqualifies her to think clearly. And now NARAL of course has to jump in to wring its hands in public and restart the cash flow to its cause.
Maybe it’s just the mists of time making everything look pretty, but it does seem like there was a day when choosing judges had some dignity involved somewhere in the process. And all for nothing. Except for the most extreme and obvious ideologs of the Scalia/Thomas/Roberts kind, nobody has any idea how a justice will come down on any issue, as witness examples like Warren, O’Connor, and Souter for starters. We need a better way of choosing members of the Court, but are stuck with yet another stink bomb planted by the founders.