This Court!!!

The Supreme Court is shaping up to be very significant in terms of issues involving race, at least the way I see this session. The justices are poised to decide some high-profile cases that could have long-term effects and certainly a huge impact on African and Hispanic Americans.

This is very serious because Ray Charles can see that the Roberts court is more conservative than any of its recent predecessor which surely does not bode well for minorities. Can I remind you that they do wear robes, which are more dangerous than the folks who wear the white ones.

Their decisions will have a huge impact on the president who suddenly finds himself running for reelection not only against Mitt Romney and the House Republicans, but now against the Court as well. The influence of the four conservative justices has already been witnessed in the January decision on Texas' redistricting maps.

The big thing before them is the future of Healthcare, which is critical but there is another hot-button issue - anti-immigration laws. The top court will hear oral arguments April 25 on the Obama administration's challenge to Arizona's controversial law. The administration says such laws are irreconcilable with federal laws. Should the court uphold Arizona's law, Latinos would feel the effects nationwide as other state will surely follow with more to do the same.

More serious, in my opinion, is the court's ideological shift on affirmative action in an upcoming case that could undo the compromise reached in Grutter v. Bollinger. That 2003 ruling barred public colleges from using a point system to boost minority enrollment, but allowed race to be taken into account to achieve academic diversity. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor, a key swing vote, wrote the majority opinion is not there this time and her replacement, Justice Samuel Alito, reflects the court's extreme rightward turn.

Another indication is that Robert’s made this statement that should provide some insight to his thinking: "The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race". He wrote this regarding a 2007 decision striking down school desegregation programs in Seattle and Kentucky. If the issues of race and education or poverty were that simple!

The way this court has rendered decisions harkened back to a time I thought was long past. Maybe you can remember the Dread Scott Decision during slavery or Plessey v Ferguson which ushered in what history has recorded as “Separate but Equal”. If that does not ring a bell how about calling it as it was –Apartheid American style.

I am going to go out on a limb and say the fate of Obamacare is not as dire as it appears at this moment. I think it is possible, even likely, that the Court will uphold part if not all of the legislation because the Court is keenly aware of public opinion and hopeful still has a bit of sanity. With the public’s trust of the judicial branch tying a historic low of 63 percent, down thirteen points from just two years ago, it’s doubtful that Roberts—who has wanted to be seen as an impartial “umpire”—would choose to imperil that trust even further with a ruling that would place the Court squarely in the election-season crossfire.

Overturning Obamacare would be a political decision but this is the court that thinks – corporations are people. With that said, the other two issues – all bets are off! And that’s my Thought Provoking Perspective…

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Grand Ol’ Party v Supreme Court Nominee Sonia Sotomayor = WTF

I am going to start by saying I am appalled by the actions of the Grand Ol’ Party’s treatment of Supreme Court Nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor. Since I’ve lived through segregation, Jim Crow and have experienced racism - I should not be surprised. Actually, this behavior was reminiscent of days long past when the likes of Strom Thurmond and George Wallace espoused their vision of America. The tone used against the justice during nominating hearings was such a sad commentary on the part of these “Senators” and most right wing misfits in general. I suppose the reasons for this behavior, other than the obvious, is simple: President Obama, the first black president picked her and that she is the first Hispanic in history picked to wear the robe of a justice on the high court.

Many people of this ideology, who are practicing identity politics (race baiting), have attacked Judge Sonia Sotomayor personally, professionally, and in a sense all minorities. Of course the GOP’s main issue is the 10 year old remark: a Latina’s “experiences as women and people of color" are factors that "should affect our decisions, can make better decisions than a white man”. This remark caused white men/people to call her a reverse racist but it seems to me that they are afraid of extinction as a result of this new day in American politics. As an example or maybe to prove their point they trotted out the firemen who had their reverse discrimination claim rejected by Sotomayor and two other appeals court judges. The Supreme Court overturned that ruling late last month.

Some of the words, code words, used to belittle and disrespect her were “militant, a welfare queen, racist, liberal, activist, left-wing, affirmative action baby, temperamental, nasty, and a bully”. In addition, they believe she would bring her biases and a political agenda to the bench supporting minority positions that conservatives like to use to arouse their base. They even went so far as to use Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to beat up on her. One Senator went so far as to say during the confirmation hearing – “you got lots to splain” mocking a famous Cuban American comedian. But, the worst and most disrespectful of their insults was calling her “unqualified”.

Just a little about Judge Sonia Sotomayor who has, arguably, lived the American dream. Born to a Puerto Rican family and grew up in a public housing project in the South Bronx. Her father was a factory worker with a third-grade education, and died when Sotomayor was nine years old. Her mother raised Sotomayor while working as a nurse. After her father's death, Sotomayor reportedly turned to books for solace, and she says it was her love of Nancy Drew books that ultimately led her to the law.

Judge Sotomayor graduated as valedictorian of her class at Blessed Sacrament and at Cardinal Spellman High School in New York. She won a scholarship to Princeton where she continued to excel, graduating summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. She was a co-recipient of the M. Taylor Pyne Prize, the highest honor Princeton awards to an undergraduate. At Yale Law School, Judge Sotomayor served as an editor of the Yale Law Journal and as managing editor of the Yale Studies in World Public Order.
After law school, Sotomayor spent five years as Assistant District Attorney in Manhattan, trying dozens of criminal cases. Robert Morgenthau chose her for the position and described her as a "fearless and effective prosecutor." She entered private practice in 1984, working as an international corporate litigator handling cases involving everything from intellectual property to banking, real estate and contract law.

In 1998, Judge Sotomayor became the first Latina to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, one of the most demanding circuits in the country. Serving as a federal judge for 17 years, the last 11 on the appeals court in New York, participating in over 3000 panel decisions and authored roughly 400 opinions, handling difficult issues of constitutional law, to complex procedural matters, to lawsuits involving complicated business organizations. If, no when, confirmed to the highest court in the land, Judge Sotomayor would bring more federal judicial experience to the Supreme Court than any justice in 100 years, and more overall judicial experience than anyone confirmed for the Court in the past 70 years... Enough said, I could go on an on. UNQUALIFIED???

Frankly, I am vexed because the last eight years of gangsta politics, all the lies and bad decisions about Iraq, W.M.D.’s, domestic surveillance, looted the treasury, torture, rendition and secret hit squads, Katrina, running the economy into the ground, use of fear, paranoia and revenge. Not to mention the only minority faces surrounding the Grand Ol’ Party were people who reminded me of my uncle whose name was Tom. Mind you, this is the same group that championed a governor from the wilderness who embodied the definition of irrational, volatile and a scattered country-music queen without the music as the their savior. Let’s not forget that it was the last Grand Ol’ Party leader who refused, would not accept, and did not attend any of the NAACP annual conferences – that would be eight. WTF!!!

Lastly, of the 111 Supreme Court Justices to date - all have been white men but four. So I say having a court as well as all areas of government representing the faces of America is America the beautiful. God Bless America…

Thank you Mr. President

I am a man who believes education is the single most important ingredient necessary to neutralize those forces that breed poverty and despair. Certainly as an African American I know the misery of both and understand that this was/is by design as a result of colonization impose upon people of African heritage dating back to the day the first human cargo landed on the shores of Jamestown, Virginia. What that means is the law of the land. Hence, I have come to understand that education although important is not the most serious problem we face in trying to survive in this place the slaves called “merica”. I submit that the most serious impediment to our survival is the “LAW” – the criminal justice system.

Therefore, I say thank you Mr. President for being a principled man of integrity making me and dare I say a people proud to have witnessed a sea change in the consciousness of America. I believe his presidency will in affect balance the scales of justice thereby giving African Americans something that we have never encountered in the history of this nation, which is fair dealing as it relates to the “law” - but it is far more significant than that. Let me explain.

First he will, possibility, have an opportunity to appoint three or more Supreme Court Justices who will more than likely not be conservative in their approach or assessment of an opinion. Let me add that an appointment to the bench is for life and will effect generations correcting many injustices - long-term. Secondly, and more importantly, he has appointed Mr. Eric Holder to head the Department of Justice who is the first African American head and leader of this critical agency. I believe this will produce immediate relief for a people, and black men in particular, who find that justice usually means “just-us”.

So I say again, thank you Mr. President.

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