Well, this is a disturbing pick for a Supreme Court Justice. President Barack Obama announced today that he is nominating Sonia Sotomayor to replace retiring Justice David Souter. Sotomayor has served in the Southern District court of New York since 1991 until she was elevated to the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in 1998 by then President Clinton. In most instances, this level of experience would certainly qualify someone for a nomination to the Supreme Court, but it is her very decisions and opinions expressed during this service that make here unqualified in my opinion.

Allow me to preface this by stating that I believe a nomination by the President to any position should receive an up or down vote by the Senate for confirmation based upon the candidate’s qualification to hold the position and not based upon the political agenda of the candidate or the Senate. Nominees for the Supreme Court should not be asked how they would vote on this issue or that in an attempt to flesh out their political tendencies, because those tendencies should not come into play when they are judging the law. It is insane to ask a Justice nominee of any level to pre-judge an issue without the benefit of hearing all the sided before making that decision. Any nominee, who would willingly give such an answer, obviously admitting prejudice or preconceived convictions on an issue, should be immediately disqualified. However, past decisions and behaviors are well within the scope of the approval process.

Her name was immediately familiar to me when she was announced, but with a modest effort of research, I find myself with serious questions about this candidate’s qualifications to sit on the highest court in the nation. One such glaring case that calls to question the impartiality of Sotomayor is currently awaiting review by the very court to which she has been nominated.

In 2003, New Haven, Connecticut issued a civil service examination to its firefighters to fill eight vacant lieutenant and seven vacant captain positions within in the department. The test material was known to all those tested and was administered to 77 employees who desired a chance to fill the fifteen vacant positions. When the test was completed and scored, it returned almost all white candidates to fill the promotion positions. None of the nineteen black firefighters who took the test made the cut. The City of New Haven made the decision not to certify the results of the test and not to give the promotions that were promised because they felt the test was somehow racially biased toward the white candidates. How this could have been possible is not clear since the testing material was available to all candidates who took the test. The white firefighters sued the city for racial discrimination, claiming that their successful scores had been disregarded based solely on the color of their skin.

To me this is a clear cut case. Even with the New Haven claiming that the test itself was racially biased, it matters not. How can a test asking questions about firefighting, an activity that is performed by men and women of all races, be racially biased towards ‘white’ firefighters? Is it the fault of the successful, high scoring candidates that the city presented a bad test? Should they be punished for the quality of a test that they were asked to take? The test was announced to all, the materials made available to all and it was presented that the top scoring candidates would receive promotion based on their scores. When the scores did not reflect what the city determined was ‘racially appropriate’ they changed the rules. In my opinion this is a clear cut case of discrimination based upon racial factors only. The firefighters who scored the highest on the test for promotion were denied those promotion because the color of their skin. The city was wrong.

This case came before Judge Sotomayor and she denied the appeal, siding with the lower court decision against the firefighters. However, this is not the real issue with her involvement in this case. The 2nd Circuit Court’s decision was unusually quick and their opinion added basically nothing to support their decision or uphold the decision of the lower court. Fellow 2nd Circuit Court Judge Jose Cabranes went so far as to claim that, “Indeed, the opinion contains no reference whatsoever to the constitutional claims at the core of this case. … This perfunctory disposition rests uneasily with the weighty issues presented by this appeal.”

This drew the attention of the Supreme Court who heard the issue in April with most analysts agreeing that the City of New Haven did not fare well. If this is overturned, it will be the fifth such decision of Sotomayor’s that the Supreme Court has reversed often citing improper application or misinterpretation of the law.

If this were the only example of such judicial irresponsibility, it would not cause as much alarm, but it seems that Judge Sotomayor is incapable of separating her personal racially tinted opinions from affecting her decisions. Allow her own words to illustrate my opinion, from her 2001 UC Berkeley speech: “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.” Uhm, what? Well that is a purely racist statement in itself. If I said that I would hope that a well educated white man would make better decisions than (insert any other race / sex combination here), I would be chastised as the ultimate sheet wearing racist on the spot. There were plenty more examples that re-enforced my belief that this woman is not qualified to sit on the Supreme Court.

A Justice is supposed to apply the law impartially, fairly and without preconceived opinions about the issues before it. A Supreme Court Justice is ultimately responsible to the Constitution of the United States and is supposed to uphold it regardless of their personal beliefs, political tendencies or opinions. They are NOT meant to reinterpret the law, massage the law or change the law. They are meant to uphold it. It appears that Sonia Sotomayor is simply incapable of doing this.

It is perhaps pertinent that more than one voice cry out on this topic. It must be noted that this document is in no way an official paper. This document has no legal precedent or meaning. But if the thoughts and opinions of the first, greatest, and noblest of our Presidents who helped frame and fight for our constitution does not matter, then nothing does. I believe you would be hard pressed to find anyone who would have listened to this speech delivered and disagreed with it. The thoughts expressed here are the same feelings and intentions that were penned in our Declaration of Independence, our Constitution, and our Bill of Rights. The reason such documents exist in such a way is that Washington, Jefferson, Franklin and all the other founders were of like mind in these thoughts and principles. They may have had their disagreements, such as the Jefferson vs. Hamilton conflicts, but they still believed in the same fundamental guiding truths in how a government is to be run by the people and for the people.

Furthermore, I challenge anyone to disagree with or debate these points. Be they liberal, conservative, or any place in between no civil minded rational person is going to tell you that they know better than Washington. A person that can look you in the eye and say that Washington didn’t know what he was talking about is a person who needs to find a new place to live. The United States of America was built, bled for, and maintained by the vigilance of this man and as far as I’m concerned if he said it, it’s probably true with anything concerning the government of the United States of America.

19) Towards the preservation of your government, and the permanency of your present happy state, it is requisite, not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority, but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be to effect, in the forms of the constitution, alterations, which will impair the energy of the system, and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be invited, remember that time and habit are at least as necessary to fix the true character of governments, as of other human institutions; that experience is the surest standard, by which to test the real tendency of the existing constitution of a country; that facility in changes, upon the credit of mere hypothesis and opinion, exposes to perpetual change, from the endless variety of hypothesis and opinion; and remember, especially, that, for the efficient management of our common interests, in a country so extensive as ours, a government of as much vigor as is consistent with the perfect security of liberty is indispensable. Liberty itself will find in such a government, with powers properly distributed and adjusted, its surest guardian. It is, indeed, little else than a name, where the government is too feeble to withstand the enterprises of faction, to confine each member of the society within the limits prescribed by the laws, and to maintain all in the secure and tranquil enjoyment of the rights of person and property.

The very first thing of note is that he warns that we take the highest precaution when modifying or deviating from the constitution. This is not something to be taken lightly, for he understood as we should still understand that if our nation does not adhere to the rock of its foundation that it will ultimately perish. Any form of deviation from the constitution not made through lawful, careful, debate is a recipe for disaster. He speaks of the spirit of innovation on its principles. This alone is proof against the Constitution as a living, breathing document. To take present mindset and decide how to better interpret the constitution is folly. The document is fine as it was written, to ‘update’ is akin to ‘rewrite’ and this is all present progressives seek to do. These people believe their ideas are better than the ones that founded this country, but ironically if we stuck to the principles of our founding we could test their theory.

Permit me to expand on that point for a moment. Originally the government was to be majority state run. Texas would handle Texas affairs, and New York would take care of its business. The federal government was never supposed to exercise the present kind of broad reaching authority. The federal level was for interstate commerce, national defense, and foreign relations. That’s pretty well all the founders intended it to do. But today the only form of government that matters anymore is federal because it pays for almost everything with our money and forces the states to cater to its every whim. If our elected officials would allow the government to be run as intended people from all political factions could set up in a state, run it like they want and we could all benefit from observing their successes and failures. And for those of us who don’t like it there would be 49 other states to choose from in order to escape policy you disagree with. However in our current system as butchered as it has become there is no escape without moving to another nation entirely.

Washington’s next point is made in a lengthy and fairly complicated statement. He seeks to point out that if changes are made to our system it will take time and experience to judge them right or wrong and equal time and experience to change them back. He advises us that we should use history and the successes and failures of a system to be our surest safeguard against failings in the future. In other words those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. This is a lesson that the current administration does not seem to believe. For all the mistakes currently being made are not new, nor have they been new for a long time. But the American people voted for change and regardless if that change is good or bad they will get it.

He finishes this paragraph with an enforcement of the balance of power. Again in our present situation the Federal government is not held in check by the states in any form. The Congress is not properly held in check by the President, and the Judicial system is over-reaching its boundaries with every new decision by renegade Judges who we as a nation fail to halt. How can liberty grow in an environment so bent out of shape that it fails to even resemble the original system?

His final sentence is perhaps the most frightening as it is all too real. Our current government is indeed too feeble to withstand the enterprise of faction. It doesn’t matter the party, when too many from one party get into power at the federal level they now have the strength to hijack the nation and take it in any direction they see fit, with no consequence. Our elected officials no longer find themselves confined by the law of our land and as such have grown fat and careless on the lifeblood of the American taxpayer.

Much of this is due to the state of our current two party system which Washington also warns about, but that is perhaps a discussion for another time.

In a shocking move of clarity and constitutional integrity, it appears that the Supreme Court of the United States today decided that they were not the ultimate power in the land. After deciding to ignore precedence and the separation of powers in the detainee decision and trampling on the states right’s by preventing them from executing those who rape children, the SCOTUS decided that they would follow what the constitution actually says for a change.

I wrote about this challenge of the Second Amendment a few months ago. This was the first time that the Second Amendment’s right of an individual to bear firearms had actually been heard before the court and was a pivotal case. The court had the opportunity to affirm that the Second Amendment granted and individual and personal right to possess a firearm and today they did just that. The other choice for them would have been ignore the language of the Constitution and decide that, once again, they knew betters than the founders of our nation. Thankfully this did not happen.

Not an impressive record for the court this month. Three paramount issues have been before them and this is the only one they got right. If I failed to do my job properly 66% of the time, I would be looking for employment in short order. That is unless I worked for the government or possibly the fast food industry, both of which seem to celebrate mediocrity and reward ignorance.

I guess even a liberal leaning activist court can stumble on to the right decision occasionally. I just hope that the bumbling around that they do the other majority of the time will not end up completely destroying this nation. We will see…

I am sorry for the lack of posts and the lack of responses to comments. I have had some personal issues that took precedence to the site this weekend and all of my energy has been focused on my family, as of course it should be in such circumstances.

However, when I hear of the Supreme Court decision barring capital punishment in cases where a child was the victim of a rape, I had to post something. If there is a class of criminals that is more deserving of death than those that prey sexually on children, I could barely imagine what that class would be. Pedophilia in general is a crime that I would support the death penalty for in general since most scientific bodies now recognize that such severe sexual deviance cannot ever be cured and only dangerously controlled.

I am not talking about a 22 year old who was caught having consensual sex with a 16 year old like we have seen in some of teacher scandals or you would find with some dumb college guy dating a high school girlfriend. While both of those are still crimes and considered to be statutory rape in most states, they do not elevate to the level of pedophilia and are nor a forced situation.

People who prey on children deserve to be hung from a tree in public by their feet with dusty rags shoved in their nose and mouth, a slow painful death by suffocation. That punishment obviously being cruel and unusual, they should at the very least be marched into the town square and executed publicly.

I swear that if anyone ever harmed one of my children in such a way, they would be sentenced to death and I would probably receive a long sentence myself for carrying out the first one.