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Sonya Somediocre Reveals Her Motives "Unwisely"

Our newest and dimmest Supreme Court Justice, Sonia Sotomayor (Somediocre) reveals the classic liberal mindset.  This is from James Taranto's Best of the Web Today for June 2:
 
 
 
"The Sounds of Silence
Van Chester Thompkins murdered Samuel Morris by shooting him in Southfield, Mich. Yesterday the U.S. Supreme Court upheld his conviction, turning aside his claim that police had violated his Miranda rights. As CNN reports:
In a 5-4 ruling, the court said a suspect must explicitly tell officers he or she is asserting that right, known as Miranda rights. . . .
"A suspect who has received and understood the Miranda warnings, and has not invoked his Miranda rights, waives the right to remain silent by making an uncoerced statement to police," said Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the court.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by three other justices (if you guess who they are, you will be correct), wrote a vigorous dissent from the court's ruling in Berghuis v. Thompkins:

Today's decision turns Miranda upside down. Criminal suspects must now unambiguously invoke their right to remain silent--which, counterintuitively, requires them to speak. At the same time, suspects will be legally presumed to have waived their rights even if they have given no clear expression of their intent to do so.
There's something screwy about Sotomayor's logic.The court did not hold that Thompkins could be compelled to speak, only that he had to speak up in order to exercise his right to end the interrogation, which is a corollary to the right to remain silent. Having failed to do so, he still had every right to remain silent--a right he could easily have exercised by remaining silent. "
 
 
 
This is a classic case of a liberal judge wanting desperately to find a way to find in favor of the criminal and against police, but being totally unable to find any intelligent (or even intelligible) rationale for doing so.  However, like a good American lefty, she doesn't let that deter her.  The other leftists on the court probably signed onto her opinion with relief, since it spares them the embarrassment of having to write something absurdly illogical themselves.
 
In a speech before her elevation to the high court, Sotomayor famously 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."[15] "  It's a pity she couldn't recommend one...
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When Barry Ducked Jan

Just recently, we heard that the magnificent Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona was headed to Washington, and that BO wasn't going to meet with her until  public criticism forced him to agree to a meeting.  For once the pundits refrained from trying to determine the reasons why (or in this case why not), so I'll give my analysis.  Relax -- it's short.
 
In a previous post I speculated about the cowardice and the bullying nature inherent in BO's foreign policy.  When I heard of his planning to duck the strong-willed Arizona Governor, I thought to his earlier "snub" of Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.  In that famous incident, Baby Barry left the thoroughly adult Israeli cooling his heels in a White House room, while the petulant president went off to have dinner with his wife and kids.  Thinking back, I found myself wondering, was it a snub, or was Barry running away?  It's becoming increasingly clear that Barry gets very upset whenever anyone opposes him, or even asks him challenging questions.  (Remember that he went ten months between press conferences.) He also has demonstrated an unusual fear of speaking "without a net" -- that is, without a teleprompter or a text to read from.  I've long maintained that he is not actually very intelligent, and I think that deep down below the arrogance he suspects it, too. 
 
Thinking further back, I notice that even though he "earned" a law degree from Harvard Law, we hear no stories about his courtroom brilliance, or even that he ever appeared in one.  Lawyers in court, more than most other professionals, have to "think on their feet" or lose their case.  Can he do it to even an average standard?  Can he in fact even win a saloon debate?  Could this bar member hold his own in a bar?  I suspect that my lawyer friend Tony the Libertarian would make mince-meat of BO in debate.  I sus[pect I would, too.
 
I think he ran away from Netanyahu for the same reason he was planning to avoid Jan Brewer -- he was afraid of losing the debate.  God save these United States from our folly in electing an empty-headed, linguini-spined narcissistic Marxist to our highest office.
 
We've got to start checking resumes more carefully around here -- before it's too late.
 
Added at 3:49 -- When Governor Brewer does meet with Barry BS, I suggest she smuggle a micro-cassette recorder in with her.  Otherwise, she may be amazed at the version of events that the White House leaks as an "authentic account" of their meeting.
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Memorial Day

Yesterday my wife and I pulled cemetery duty.

We went to Holy Sepulchre Cemetery in Rochester, NY to tend to some family graves.  We always tend the graves in the same order.  First we tended the graves of my uncle Mickey and Aunt Janina (Uncle Mickey served in World War II, first fighting the Nazis in Poland and then in Africa), then to my wife's sister Sandy's grave, then to my grandmother's grave (she won a medal from the Polish government for her resistance activities in Poland during World War II), and lastly to my brother John's grave (he served in Vietnam).  We planted flags, cleared overhanging grass (all of the stones are ground-level), and brushed off the stones so that they can be clearly read. 

That's what Memorial Day is to us.  No picnic.  No party.  It's a day of memory.  I believe that's the point.

I go to the cemetery several times a year to tend the graves.  It became mandatory and personal some years ago, when my nieces Rachel and Michelle went to the cemetery with me.  We found Uncle Mickey and Aunt Janina's grave sadly neglected, and Rachel, a young woman of strong emotions, began to cry.  She asked "Where are their children?  Where are their grandchildren?  Why aren't they taking care of their graves?"  At this point I decided that this nephew would never let that happen again.  I know that they are not there -- they're in Heaven where they belong.  Still, it's a sign of respect.

Besides, I'm hoping that I will see them again, and I'd rather not have to answer that particular embarrassing question.  There will be plenty of others...

My wife, my friend Neo-Con A, and others ask me why I watch military history with such intensity.  It's a somewhat complex answer, which I may come back to someday.  When it comes to the World Wars, there is an extra factor which cannot be denied.  When I watch or read material on those wars, I am watching something that actually happened to my family.  My maternal grandfather (who I never met)was gassed and lost an arm in World War I.  My grand-uncle Bill (see previous parenthetical) was also gassed, and suffered bouts of madness for the rest of his life.  My mother's experiences of World War II cannot be reduced to a sentence.  I could (and someday will) go on.

I can never know what they went through -- but I owe them my best efforts to try.



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A Kinder, Gentler Scrap Heap?

I may have a problem.  I made the mistake of telling my church-and Knights of Columbus friend Dominic about this blog, and now he wants to read it.  I told him I couldn't remember the address (actually true - that's what Favorites lists are for).  I warned him that he may find my tone a little harsh.  Dominic is one of the most maddeningly pleasant people I've ever known.  It's like hanging with Jay Nordlinger of National Review Online, only without even the tiny flashes of irritation that Genial Jay gives us. Anyway, if Dominic doesn't understand why I call this site The Hermit Crab, he's about to.
 
 
 
Paul Krugman of the New York Times has won an odd sort of following among conservatives, and honest people in general.  He has become Exhibit A of the Blinded by Ideology branch of insanity.  In almost every column, what you read from the ex-Enron advisor (hat tip to James Taranto of the Wall Street Journal) is a sort of funhouse mirror view of reality.  We often find ourselves hoping that he's lying to us.  If he thinks things really are as he describes, he needs help.  Some columnist's columns have titles, for example Thomas Franks weekly drivel in the Wall Street Journal is called "The Tilting Yard".  I recommend that the Times title Krugman's fantasies "Through the Looking Glass".
 
 
 
To anyone who read the above item and said "But didn't Krugman win the Nobel Prize for economics?", I would respond that this tells us more about the Nobel Prize Committee and O'Sullivan's First Law ("All organizations not expressly right-wing become left-wing over time.") than it does about economics.
 
 
 
There was a dust-up in New York State recently concerning His Accidency Governor David Patterson's proposal to furlough all state workers one day a week as a deficit-cutting measure.  Here in the Empire State, the average government worker makes almost precisely twice as much per year as the average private sector employee.  That's without counting the very generous benefit packages our tax leeches receive.  If they're to be furloughed one day per week, that means that they would "only" be making 80% more per year than the private sector workers paying their salaries and benefits.  You'll pardon me if I'm unsympathetic...
 
 
 
Beware of Media Statistics Lesson One:
 
A few years ago, loony leftist Senator Barbara Mikulski publicly complained that "only" 13% of the government's health research spending was devoted to researching women-specific diseases.  Babbling Babs neglected to mention that only 6% of the spending went to researching men-specific diseases.  The remaining 81% went to research diseases that afflict both sexes.
 
Looks a little different when you add that in, doesn't it?
 
 
 
Beware of Media Statistics Lesson Two:
 
Recently the media carried reports that claimed that it was scandalous that over half of the vendors at gun shows did not have federal firearm dealer licenses.  Horrifying?  Actually, no.  What the media consistantly "forgot" to mention is that over half of the vendors at gun shows were not selling firearms.  They were selling t-shirts, holsters, trigger locks, gun safes, etc. 
 
Still terrified?
 
 
 
After the failed bombing in Time Square in New York City, the Poisoned Apple of the Nightly News, Katie Couric, interviewed Nanny Michael Bloomberg, the megalomaniacal mayor of NYC, and Bloomberg speculated on the identity of the bomber (who had not yet been captured):
 
"Homegrown, maybe a mentally deranged person or someone with a political agenda that doesn’t like the health care bill or something."
 
I'm glad he added that last bit.  I thought he was confessing!
 
 
 
I was reading about the furor over the Arizona Illegal Immigration Law (which I support whole-heartedly), and I read that one writer was not optimistic about the prospects that the law would face before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals (known to many as the 9th Circus Court for its rampant, delusional leftism).  Call me a radical, but I don't see how the 9th Circus has authority in this case.  Since illegal immigrants don't have constitutional rights (not to be confused with legal rights), and since nothing in the Constitution forbids a state government from making an act already a violation of federal law also an offense under state law, I think this is a job for the 10th Amendment.  Contrary to leftist opinion, the Bill of Rights was never repealed.  If the 9th Circus rules the law unconstitutional, I would support the great state of Arizona in standing its ground and keeping its law, and I hope you would, too.
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They Flipped Us Off Again

Did anyone besides me notice that the Democrats rushed through Congress's vote to repeal the ban on open homosexuals serving in the military in time for the Memorial Day weekend?  They just can't resist insulting everything that's made America great at the most offensive times, can they?  Remember that they pushed through the dreadful Obamacare bill in the Senate on Christmas Eve.
 
Aargh... 
 
Have a nice holiday weedend anyway, and come back ready to fight for your country's traditions and future.  I'll be ready!!
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Anybody Remember this Watergate Phrase?

Now the White House says that ex-President Billy Jeff Clinton conveyed an offer of an unpaid post to Joe Sestak to get out of the way of Benedict Specter's re-election bid.  How tempted would you be to drop out of a race with an unpopular (on merit) incumbent to the "World's Greatest Deliberative Body" to take an unpaid position? 
 
Stay tuned.  This looks like a "modified limited hang-out" to me.  It might be fun watching it unravel.  As the old Washington saw goes, "It's not the crime that sinks you -- it's the cover-up".
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Schumer's Cynical Gambit

New York's senior Senatorial Embarrassment, Charles Schumer (D-DSCC) has introduced a bill trying to re-impose handcuffs and ankle-chains on businesses that might wish to exercise their right of free speech regarding political matters, such as whether certain Democrats deserve to be elected or (in Cut-Throat Charlie's case) re-elected this November. (By some amazing oversight, Charlie forgot to include the big unions who give enormously to Democrat campaigns in his cuffing and chaining.)  Some of us may point out that the Supreme Court just tossed strictures similar to these in the last session in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission.  Won't the court toss these strictures, too?
 
Perhaps, but I think people may be missing the point.  Don't forget that we're talking about Charles Schumer, the man who is 0% statesman, and 100% political thug.  The man who believes that the Bill of Rights are outdated and unnecessary.  The political sharpie who did (it must be admitted) recruit the phony conservative candidates that won the Democrats the majority in the Senate in 2006, and an increased majority in 2008.  Give the slippery eel credit -- he knows the political winds.  He knows that the storm winds are blowing into the Democrats' faces this year. 
 
I think he knows that the new strictures may well go the way of the old ones -- but it will take time.  If the Democrats give the new, unconstitutional, blatantly slanted rules a big, desperate push, they can get them into place in time for the Labor Day election homestretch.  They are gambling that this will give them just enough of an advantage to hold onto enough seats in the House and the Senate to keep an operating majority.
 
They know they're cheating, but when did that ever stop them before?
 
 
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The Underlying Error of our Southern Border Policy

In my eyes, we have one problem in our view of our border with Mexico which is causing most of the present troubles.  BO, and the Presidents before him, keep looking at the Mexican government as a friendly one.  This is untrue.  We in fact have a hostile (or at least unfriendly) nation on our southern flank, and we should defend (not just secure) that border accordingly.  There have been armed incursions across the border by heavily-armed drug-smugglers, sometimes even assisted by Mexican armed forces.  These should be repelled by force of arms when they occur.  Any protest from Calderon should be met with the words of Charles Francis Adams -- "It wpuld be superfluous in me to point out ... that this is war."
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Media Bias 201: Poisoning the Well of History

Way back in 1987, Oliver North testified before the Iran-Contra Committee, and largely took the country by storm.  My father sent me a "Keep North, Fire Congress" bumper sticker for my car.  Poll after poll showed that Lt. Col. North had run rings around the committee Democrats, and even Sen. Inouye's pouty scolding of him had not dented the Ollie wave. 
 
Yet at the end of that year, Time Magazine named Lee Hamilton one of its Men of the Year, claiming that "in one day of sharp questioning", he had reversed the tide of public opinion that had been flowing North's way.  This puzzled me, as it certainly didn't match my memory of that week.  As it happened, I had watched Col. North's testimony in the company of my parents, both very intelligent people.  So I called my father, and asked him about Hamilton's "sharp questioning" ending the Ollie boom.  Dad said flatly "Never happened."  Subsequently I checked myself, and found that after Tuesday's testimony, North had a 67% approval rating nationwide, and when he finished testifying on Friday, it was still 67%.  Hamilton's "sharp questioning" had in fact made no difference at all.
 
So why did Time Magazine print such a transparent lie?  After reflecting on this for awhile, I realized that they probably weren't trying to influence opinion at that time, but they were planting false evidence in the record for future re-writers of history.  They want future historians to research the aftermath of the Iran-Contra Hearings and find this false nugget of information. 
 
In much the same way, when the late, great Bob Hope died on July 27, 2003, some writers insisted on writing in their obituaries that Bob Hope had lost popularity in later years because of his support for the Vietnam War.  I'm old enough to remember those days, of course, so I was puzzled ... and suspicious.  Back to the phone I went, and called Dad.  He confirmed my suspicion and my memory -- this had never happened, either.  (To their credit, the oft-maligned editors of Wikipedia, which I consulted to get the year of Bob Hope's death, do not seem to have fallen for this dirty trick.)
 
I ran into this again recently.  My wonderful wife Carol bought me The Century of Warfare collection, which is superb on most subjects, but they insist on peddling the leftist propaganda version of the Vietnam War.  The very first segment of the Vietnam episode is called  something like "Increasing Unpopularity of the Diem Government".  (I'm typing this at work, so I can't check the exact title.)  The Ngo Dinh Diem government was mainly unpopular with a trio of dishonest American reporters -- Seymour Hirsch, David Halberstam, and Neil Sheehan.  They poisoned the minds of their readers with false reports and ruinous scandal-mongering.  They also mislead the US ambassador to South Vietnam, Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. against President Diem, with the result that Diem and his brother Ngo Dinh Nhu were overthrown and murdered in a coup in late 1963.  None of this appears in the video, but it appears in the best history written on the early part of the Vietnam War that has appeared so far, Mark Moyar's Triumph Forsaken, which everyone who really wants to understand what happened in Vietnam must read.
 
They also show some of the most inflammatory film of the era, for example the self-immolation of Buddhist monks in protest of Diem's "repression" of their faith.  The scare quotes are appropriate -- he wasn't oppressing Buddhists.  The monks, many young and inexperienced in the deviousness of the Communists, were often tricked into immolating themselves with false stories of South Vietnamese government brutality.  Richard Nixon, in his book No More Vietnams tells of a monk who had been fed false tales of government persecution of Buddhists, and was on his way to his own self-immolation when he was forced to detour because his plotted route was obstructed.  His detour took him past unmolested worshiping Buddhists in undamaged and undisturbed shrines.  He then turned himself over to the police and told them his story.  All of this was known at the time, but the American media refused to tell the American people of it.
 
The Century of Warfare episode also shows the famous middle-of-the-street execution of a Viet Cong terrorist at Hue (I believe) during the Tet Offensive (a disaster for the Communists, portrayed by our media as an American defeat).  They neglected to mention that at the time of his capture, he had just murdered a South Vietnamese family in their own home.  Some of us might consider this significant.  I'd be sorely tempted to make short work of such a man myself...
 
I suggest you keep an eye on the media's portrayal of current events, and protest whenever they get something wrong.  The poisoned history books of tomorrow are being written in the media coverage of today.
 
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"You'd Think They'd Say 'Thank You'"

By now, most of us have "enjoyed" President BO's infamous statement at that California fundraiser, saying that he was amused to find out that people were gathering to protest his "largesse" in giving us Obamacare and other such triumphs of Socialistic Obamaism.  In fairness to BO, I can think of two people who might want to thank him, and I can "sort of" thank him myself.
 
Jimmy Carter thanks him, for making Carter look competent.
 
Billy Jeff Clinton thanks him, for making BJ (no snickering, please) look honest and humble.
 
I am sort of grateful, the way  Khrushchev was grateful to Mao for making him look good.  I have done some harm in my 50 years on Earth, and not enough good, but considering how much harm BO is doing in his shorter life span so far, I look like a direct blessing from God!
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An Easy Answer to a Vexing Question

John Brennan, the Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Adviser for Homeland Security, says (as reported by Jim Quinn of America's Morning Show) that the question that must be decided concerning terrorist Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is how to bring him to justice most swiftly.  I should think a bullet to the brain-pan would do the trick, don't you?

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Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand -- New York's Favorite Dumb Blonde

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, the non-elected Senator appointed by His Accidency the Governor of New York, David Patterson (who got the job when Governor Eliot Spitzer was forced to resign by multiple personal and professional scandals) to replace the Carpet-Bagger Senator Hillary Clinton (who only got the job because ... oh, forget it) wandered into Rochester lately.  She was addressing a gathering on so-called "green jobs", meaning jobs in industries like wind- and solar-power which need plenty of tax-payer green to keep them going.  She gave a brief speech, cut short the scheduled question-and-answer session when she ran out of answers, and then skedaddled, saying "One thing I know is that green energy creates jobs" (or some such). This despite the studies that show that for every one job created in "green energy", the effort kills 2.5 jobs in the private sector.
 
It's hard not to feel a little pity for New York's favorite dumb blonde.  She knows only one thing, and that's wrong.  If the New York State Republican Party can't knock this no-nothing out of office this fall, they should go into liquidation.
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The Scrap Heap

I was listening to America's Morning Show last week, and I heard Jim Quinn talking about the Employee Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA), which its sponsors claim will eliminate employment discrimination due to sexual orientation.  Given the type of people who would benefit from this government intrusion into private employment decision making, should they say that it would eliminate discrimination due to sexual disorientation?
 
 
 
Some people are finally pointing out the essential cowardice of BO's foreign (to logic) policy, but I would take the criticism a bit further, leaning on my own history in the process.  It isn't just cowardice that is making BO bow and scrape before the enemies of our country, be they declared (like Iran, Venezuela and North Korea) or not (Saudi Arabia or China), while offending our staunchest allies like Israel and Great Britain.  I see a hint of the formerly bullied becoming the bully.  Speaking as the former short, fat, ugly kid who was bullied in school, I suspect that skinny, jug-eared Barry may have received a bit of bullying in his younger days himself.  When maturity arrives, the formerly bullied should emerge from youth with an antipathy for bullies and bullying.  However, in the case of the perpetual adolescent who is disgracing the office which Washington first held, he seems to have developed a taste for dishing out what I suspect he received.  Like all bullies, though, he's only pushing around those who he knows won't strike back.  Israel, Great Britain, and our other allies are scarcely likely to put an assassin on his trail or a bomb on his plane, are they?
 
This is cheap psychology, of course, but I see nothing in BO's actions that contradict my theory.  Remember how he treated the stockholders in GM and Chrysler during his meddling in the bankruptcy processes of those companies?  If that wasn't bullying, then I've never seen it (and I assure you I have).
 
 
 
Given her propensity for spending oceans of taxpayer money on herself and her family (her expensive clothes, $400 sneakers, million-dollar "date nights", excessive foreign travel, etc.), I think we should start calling BO's wife Michelle Antoinette.
 
 
 
After reading of BO's disgraceful cowardice in the face of the Tea-Partying little ladies of Quincy, IL recently (he had the police turn out in riot gear to control the "mob"), I can't help thinking that the first time he meets Vladimir Putin face-to-face, he will become the first President in US history to attend a summit meeting wearing Depends.
 
 
George Will wrote a fine column April 22 on the marvelous start new New Jersey governor Chris Christie has gotten off to.  He has been a conservative dream come true, and hopefully a cautionary tale for us right-wingers as well.  I say the latter because I remember some of the coverage of the primary campaign, and particularly some writers and bloggers claiming that Christie wasn't worth supporting because he wasn't a "real conservative".  Are you so sure of that now?
 
Remeber to be humble, fellow rightists.  Sure, men like John McCain can occasionally be wrong.  So can we.
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James Taranto, Stem Cell Research, and the Pro-Life Movement

James Taranto is one of those economic conservatives who tries to keep those dreadful social conservatives at arms length, especially those pro-life fanatics (like me).  In his Best of the Web of last Friday, he wwrote this:
 
"On the other hand, liberals are wrong to cast as "antiscience" objections to embryonic stem-call research. Whether or not one agrees with these objections, they are based not on a hostility to science per se but on ethical qualms about particular forms of research. Science is a method for answering empirical questions; it cannot yield answers to moral questions such as whether a human embryo has intrinsic value."
 
Taranto never defends pro-lifers as strongly as he could, and this is no exception.  He implies that the only "scientific objection" is "whether a human embryo has intrinsic value".  Actually, the strongest scientific argument against embryonic stem cell research (ESCR) is that all that it has produced after many years and many millions of dollars of research funding is tumors.  As the late, great Tony Snow said years ago, "We don't know what we're doing!"
 
Meanwhile, research on stem cells obtained from adults or from umbilical cords has led to startling scientific advances.  If fact, stem cells are now being used to treat over 70 medical conditions.  This is stem cell research that is scientifically sound, and ethical as well.  Why hasn't the focus been on funding this branch of research?
 
Actually, although I don't know if Taranto can overcome his distaste for pro-lifers long enough to admit this, the branches of the conservative movement should be able to unite on this issue.  The social conservative, pro-life conservatives can despise ESCR for its destruction of human life, and the economic conservatives can (and should) oppose it because it is pouring precious research dollars into a scientific "black hole".
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One More Point on Ellen Kagan

Ken Klukowski has written a very good evaluation of the Kagan Supreme Court nomination.  I would like to add, however, that this nomination falls in line with my theory expressed in this space before that BO holds American institutions in contempt, and exposes them to ridicule when he has a chance.  First he gave us Sonia Sotomayor (aka Sonia SoMediocre), an Appeals Court Judge whose only distinctions in that job were indolence and shallowness of intellect.  Now he gives us Ellen Kagan, who has never even been a judge at all, and only has (according to the report I heard) 5 years courtroom experience altogether.  Imagine the hullaballoo that would have been raised if President Bush had nominated such an unqualified person to the nation's highest court.  (Actually, you don't have to imagine.  Remember Harriet Myers?)
 
We all knew that BO would nominate a screaming leftist to the court, but he could have found a qualified screaming leftist.  By nominating a candidate who has never worn judicial robes, he sticks the finger in the nation's eye again.  He's telling us that he can nominate anyone, and get them through, because the Stockholm Media will support her and, perhaps more importantly, will not investigate her.
 
Here we go again...
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