Sotomayor's 60% Reversal Rate
It seems the blogs are on fire debating whether or not Supreme Court Justice nominee Sonia Sotomayor is a racist based on the comments she made during a lecture at the University of California-Berkeley.
Referring to former Justice Sandra Day O'Connor's saying that "a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases," Sotomayor said, "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."
I'll be honest, I don't think this overtly problematic world view matters. America elected a President who, after spending 20 years under a racist pastor, referred to his own grandmother during the campaign as a "typical white person." So let's just admit that when you're a Democrat displaying racial sensitivity is about as important as actually paying your taxes. Debate over because it's never going to matter.
And while we're at it, let's forget that Sotomayor endorsed judicial activism by telling Duke students to consider clerkships on the appeals courts because "the Court of Appeals is where policy is made. And I know - I know this is on tape, and I should never say that because we don't make law. I know." Forget about that because in liberal eyes the judicial branch makes the law relevant so it is within their scope to ignore the separation of powers. It's never going to matter.
What bothers me is the fact that 60% of Sotomayor's decisions have been overturned by a higher court. Yowza. Placing a 40% success rate on the highest court in the land is like dusting off the Betamax because you're sure people are making a mistake with all this new media jibber jabber.But ask yourself how you feel about a judge who has 60% of her decisions overturned being placed in a position of power where nobody can check her balance. Is this the kind of legal mind we want deciding the country's most important issues?
SIDENOTE: I wonder if Sotomayor has paid all of he back taxes. If so, why is Obama even considering her?
5 comments :
SCOTUS overturns 75% of the cases it hears. Even by your bizarre yardstick, that' means she's well ahead of the average. What you should really be looking at is the number of cases overturned out of all of the cases she presided over: 3/380 = 0.79% reversal rate, or 99.2% of her decisions stood muster. Pretty impressive, really.
As a federal appellate court judge, Justice Alito's reversal rate was 100%.
Spider is completely correct. The reversal rate at SCOTUS is not at all significant.
The mistake that Spidergrackle and anonymous are making here is in assuming that the whores on the right CARE about truth and reality. They don't. They only care about making juicy talking points, and repeating them over and over again until the population is as misinformed as possible. Thus, despite the fact that you are correct that Sotomayor's 60% reversal rate is BETTER THAN AVERAGE, and better than the reversal rate of Alito, nobody should expect the truth-challenged whores on the right to stop making this argument!
Fair point, Simon, but this kind of stuff seeps into the public consciousness, so I do what I can to make sure that when the untruths seep in, the facts do as well.
Ah, the Khaki Elephant has uncovered 3 practitioners of Obamath, that curious "science" where numbers defy logic while "hope" springs eternal.
Since your talking points reflect the Huffington Post, you're probably not aware that another of Sotomayor's decisions is about to be reversed -- 70% here she comes! But I'm sure you'll still see that as a positive as well since it'll be right around average.
The funny thing is that I would expect most Americans want their Supreme Court filled with justices who are well above average.
Anon, I've seen you you a lot on blogs and love your pledge to spread the truth and trust you will do the same concerning the lies the Obama adminstration are pushing out to seep into the public consciousness like "this is the worst economy since the great depression" (you're probably too young to remember the Carter years, look up the numbers and you'll be stunned), "95% of Americans will get a tax break" (that's a higher percentage than actually pay taxes) . . . you get my drift.
Anyway, I agree that the truth needs to be out there and you have inspired me to start provided the gory details about Sotomayer's record. Not that it will change the vote, but it will reveal a lot about the Democrats and their President before the next elections cycle.
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