Blind Justice?

The big news in the US last week was the confirmation of Obama's pick to the US supreme court, a hispanic woman by the name of Sonia Sotomayor. Judge Sotomayor is most well known for her saying:

“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,”

Overlooking the blatant relativist fallacy of that statement, and the Democrats defence that it was a once off taken-out-of-context remark (which by the way...it wasn't), it smacks of an ideologue that puts their worldview before the Law which isn't necessarily a desirable aspect in a 'prospective' Supreme Court judge.

To demonstrate how this worldview translates to action, whilst being an Appellate Court judge on the 2nd Circuit (whatever that means), there came before them a case of Ricci vs Stefano, where the city of New Haven had set aside results of a legal and vetted promotions exam for firefighters because, get this, not enough African-Americans passed with high scores. Fearing a discrimination lawsuit, the city of New Haven decided to throw out the baby with the bathwater and denied promotion to a bunch of whiteys and a hispanic that had passed the test. From the Slate article:

"They appealed to the 2nd Circuit, the court on which Judge Sotomayor sits. In an unusual short and unsigned opinion, a panel of three judges, including Sotomayor, adopted the district court judge's ruling without adding their own analysis. As Judge Jose Cabranes put it, in protesting this ruling later in the appeals process, "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."

In other words, Judge Sotomayor sided with the city of New Haven but didn't say why. The high court recently sided with the plaintiffs (the firemen) and Sotomayors lack of, if you'll excuse the pun, judgment was especially noted by the Supreme Court.

So now you have the background, here's a column from the New York Times, Maureen Dowd, who is kind of like The Age's Catherine Deveny, except Maureen can write, is occasionally funny, and despite being a dyed in the wool Bush/Republican hater, she can sometimes see opposing arguments. However, this is not one of those times. Dripping with barely disguised hatred of 'dem old white males, speaking of the serving justices:

"After all, these guys have never needed to speak inspirational words to others like them, as Sotomayor has done. They’ve had codes, handshakes and clubs to do that."

Any of the achievements and/or hardships these guys may or may not have overcome are not expanded on, just the age old trope of old school tie network and shadowy secret societies that put these guys on the bench, not merit.

And for the meat and potatoes:

"President Obama wants Sotomayor, naturally, to bring a fresh perspective to the court. It was a disgrace that W. appointed two white men to a court stocked with white men. And Sotomayor made it clear that she provides some spicy seasoning to a bench when she said in a speech: “I simply do not know exactly what the difference will be in my judging, but I accept there will be some based on gender and my Latina heritage.”

And for those not familiar with of US Supreme Court history, there's no mention that the "disgraceful W.'s" dad (George H.W. Bush) nominated the second African-American to ever serve on the Supreme Court. Freakin' racist Texans...

Looking past that, the idea that any job can be done better by someone due to their race or ethnicity is quite simply racist if it is 'minority' ethnicities discriminated against, and "diversity" if it is whitey that gets the sharp end of the stick. Artificially enforced sex or racial quotas seems to go against that idea that "all men are created equal" (and yes, that is "men" as in "mankind" which also includes wise latina women). Whilst not arguing that wrongs were not committed in the past, primarily by white males, I don't see how appointing someone on the basis of race rather than merit is a way of redressing those wrongs.