Sonia for the Supreme Court

President Barack Obama has chosen Justice David Souter's replacement on the U.S. Supreme Court: Sonia Sotomayor, a federal appeals court judge from New York. Much is being made of the fact that she is a Latina, with some on the (bitter) right complaining that this was why she was wrongly (to them) picked in the first place. And already the nitpicking against her has commenced, with Fox News and its commentator, former Bush Administration sludge-master Karl Rove, taking the lead. All I heard on the "fair and balanced" channel was a procession of critics to this nomination. So I switched over to MSNBC to hear Andrea Mitchell interview a right-wing legal think tank spokesman rail against it as well. And his number one reason to oppose Obama's nomination? Because it was Obama's nomination!

It may be useful to remind some of these people that Obama is the elected President and will be making nominations for a while, thank you. From what I see of Sonia Sotomayor, she is a very capable, accomplished jurist who will make the Supreme Court a better institution. I wish the best for her confirmation and am keenly interested in seeing whether the Senate Republicans will allow the confirmation to proceed or whether they will decide to decimate their own party by rejecting such a highly qualified candidate from the increasingly politically powerful Hispanic community.

But now I hear that right wing extremist Rush Limbaugh, the de facto leader of the Republican Party and an authority on racist comments (he is a master at making them), has publicly pronounced Judge Sotomayor as being "racist". Now that their "master" has spoken, it will be interesting to see how many Republican senators pander to Limbaugh on this viewpoint!