by Heath Cleaveland

Created on: June 01, 2009   Last Updated: June 03, 2009

Is diversity in the court so important that we ignore a serious case of reverse racism? Personally, I have no doubt that we all stand to gain from having minority candidates for prestigious positions. However, there is no cause to support statements about racist claims, even if we might imagine they were taken out of context.

In any case, where you have a statement making the claim that a member of one race or gender is better than a member of another race or gender in any context, you have a racist statement. That is the definition of racism. At one point, whites all thought they were better than blacks and therefore kept them as slaves. The struggle to change that viewpoint was and is still great. But no, we cannot allow the highest positions to go to individuals who make manifestly racist statements.

The racist statement par excellence is the better than statement. If Judge Sotomayor is better than white judges, for her struggles in life where now I presume these white judges have none, then where is the misconstrual? Obama has decided it's safe to say her statement, although poorly chosen he agrees, has been taken out of context. He believes the better than statement didn't imply that she was better but rather that her experience (which she does talk about in the essay) helped her make good decisions. Is it necessary for us to include a judge on the Supreme Court who chooses to vilify white men (she also suggests women make better decisions than men period)?

At least the Freudian Slip of specifically labeling white men inferior judges is notable. So what goes into our thought process that makes us decide what to say, what to write? How can you quite come up with the idea that Latina women's experiences helps them get the edge on white men, express it in just so many words on paper, and then say that it is just one sentence in the midst of a hundred and means nothing in particular. I know when I write a sentence down, I have to evaluate and see if I think it is correct. This essay of Sotomayor's, a woman who understands that her words may be judged by others, specifically underlines how she can certainly be construed as having racist ideas.

Moreover, we have the tape where she slips and notes that the Court of Appeals is where the judge can determine policy from the bench. She knew it was a mistake to say that and she noted it immediately afterward. It's easy to see how judges make policy from the bench. They rule on cases where the

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