Booman Tribune

How One Lives Says a Lot

by BooMan
Fri May 29th, 2009 at 10:15:06 AM EST

What I find interesting in this article is not that Sonia Sotomayor went gambling with her mother in Florida and won a $8,000 jackpot. What I find interesting is that she lives in a condo in Greenwich Village and that her only other assets are between $15,000-$65,000 in checking and savings accounts. She doesn't list massive investments in Goldman Sachs or Intel or AIG. Her total annual income, which combines her check for being a judge with her check for teaching at Columbia University, is $205,000. That seems a fair but modest amount of income for someone of her academic achievements, but it is not enough for her to be impacted by Obama's tax hike on America's wealthiest individuals.

She doesn't live in a multi-million parkside penthouse on the Upper East Side. She has a condo in the Village. If you've ever been to the Village you know that it marches to its own peculiar beat. It's the center of gay life in New York City, but it is also pulsing with multicultural artistic creativity and an intellectualism that combines the legacy of the Beat Generation with the rigors of New York University's curriculum. You cannot walk the streets of the Village and call it your home without understanding modern progressivism at its core.

As people pore over her court decisions looking for signs that she is a progressive or a corporatist, they'd do well to remind themselves of these other facts. Any ambitious jurist with aspirations to be a Supreme Court Justice knows that there is a line to walk. I feel comfortable that Sotomayor will represent modern progressivism on the Court.



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Maybe this has already come up and I just missed it, but I just remembered that Bush broke the tradition of the ABA's involvement in the process of drafting the SCOTUS appointee list.  Did Obama restore their role?  I haven't heard a word about it.

The Wages of Sin is about $5.15 an Hour
by hz on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 10:45:33 AM EST
In the mindset of our ruling class, all that makes her a loser. I hope this doesn't come out before her confirmation.

FDR's response to progressive demands: "I agree. Now go out and make me do it."
by DaveW on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 10:56:53 AM EST
The more the far right freaks the heck out about her, the better I feel. So far, the mere fact of her nomination has probably shaved years off of Tom Tancredo's life.

Am I convinced that she's a true liberal on every point? No. But neither am I particularly worried. The only thing I want some reassurance on would be her views regarding Roe v. Wade.

by corvus on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 11:11:47 AM EST
Of course the Gops had their talking points finished even before they knew who Obama would nominate.Their freakout was a done deal right around January 20.

FDR's response to progressive demands: "I agree. Now go out and make me do it."
by DaveW on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 11:21:24 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Actually you are late.  The freakout was a done deal around Midnight ET .... of election night    ;-)
by Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 03:09:02 PM EST
[ Parent ]
It's also an area heavily impacted by the fallout  from 9/11.

"fallout" in the literal, not just the metaphorical, sense.

by Snarki child of Loki (whatever@snark.r.us) on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 02:12:32 PM EST
The more I hear about her, the better I like her.

Keith Olbermann speaks for me.
by JanetT in MD on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 02:32:49 PM EST
Found this at Ta-Nehisi Coates over at The Atlantic Blogs:

Keep Talking
29 May 2009 10:30 am

Just amazing. Bill Bennett (he of Superpredator fame) and Fred Barnes on Sotomayor:

BARNES: I think you can make the case that she's one of those who has benefited from affirmative action over the years tremendously.

BENNETT: Yeah, well, maybe so. Did she get into Princeton on affirmative action, one wonders.

BARNES: One wonders.

BENNETT: Summa Cum Laude, I don't think you get on affirmative action. I don't know what her major was, but Summa Cum Laude's a pretty big deal.

BARNES: I guess it is, but you know, there's some schools and maybe Princeton's not one of them, where if you don't get Summa Cum Laude then or some kind of Cum Laude, you then, you're a D+ student.

-------------------------------

They are who we thought they were.

by rikyrah on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 02:53:51 PM EST
he has a degree from UVA.  He knows better.
by BooMan on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 02:58:14 PM EST
[ Parent ]
So is Barnes calling Bush a complete idiot/loser?  By that logic he sure is.  Especially since Dubya got a gentlemen's "C" at another Ivy League institution.
by Calvin Jones and the 13th Apostle on Fri May 29th, 2009 at 03:10:50 PM EST
[ Parent ]


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