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The Spectacle Blog
Frank Rich is surely the most dishonest writer and the biggest bigot working at the New York Times today.
In his latest column this haughty bloviator who must every passing day mourn his decreasing relevance to modern political discourse as his newspaper fades away into insignificance tries to turn the tables by accusing Republican senators who grilled Judge Sonia Sotomayor during her confirmation proceeding of being the real racists.
He writes
Yet the Sotomayor show was still rich in historical significance. Someday we may regard it as we do those final, frozen tableaus of Pompeii. It offered a vivid snapshot of what Washington looked like when clueless ancien-régime conservatives were feebly clinging to their last levers of power, blissfully oblivious to the new America that was crashing down on their heads and reducing their antics to a sideshow as ridiculous as it was obsolescent. [...]
Much of the audience was surely driven away by the sheer boredom of watching white guys incessantly parse the nominee's "wise Latina" remark. This badgering was their last-ditch effort to prove that Gingrich was right when he called Sotomayor a racist at the start of the nomination process. She confronted that overheated controversy directly. "I do not believe that any ethnic, racial or gender group has an advantage in sound judgment," Sotomayor testified.
And of course on this point the hopelessly incompetent Sotomayor lied through her teeth. She made the comment repeatedly before and only backed away from it during her confirmation hearings. But her perfunctory explanation was more than enough to absolve her in Rich's eyes.
Rich continues
It's the American way that we judge people as individuals, not as groups. And by that standard we can say unequivocally that this particular wise Latina, with the richness of her experiences, would far more often than not reach a better conclusion than the individual white males she faced in that Senate hearing room. Even those viewers who watched the Sotomayor show for only a few minutes could see that her America is our future and theirs is the rapidly receding past.
Rich is correct in saying that "It's the American way that we judge people as individuals, not as groups." This is probably why Rich avoids discussing Sotomayor's vile ruling in Ricci v. DeStefano, which centered around a case in which New Haven, Connecticut discriminated against a group of firefighters precisely because they belonged to the wrong race.
One of the plaintiffs discriminated against, firefighter Ben Vargas, who like Sotomayor claims Latino heritage, testified at the hearings. Vargas said
I am Hispanic and proud of the heritage and background that Judge Sotomayor and I share. And I congratulate Judge Sotomayor on her nomination.
But the focus should not have been on me being Hispanic. The focus should have been on what I did to our new promotion to captain and how my own government and some courts responded to that. In short, they didn't care. I think it important for you to know what I did, that I played by the rules and then endured a long process of asking the courts to enforce those rules. [...]
I was shocked when I was not rewarded for this hard work and sacrifice, but I actually was penalized for it. I became not Ben Vargas, the fire lieutenant who proved themselves qualified to be captain, but a racist statistic. I had to make decisions whether to join those who wanted promotions to be based on race and ethnicity or join those who would insist on being judged solely on their qualifications and the content of their character. [...]
So Rich ignored the fact that the hearings weren't only about aggrieved white men. At least one Latino man was victimized by Sotomayor but Rich couldn't care less because he considers it his mission to defend Sotomayor at all costs.
Imagine the cognitive dissonance that must cloud Rich's troubled mind: A member of the "Latino" victim class gets thrown under the bus by Rich in his zeal to protect "a wise Latina."
And only a truly ambitious liar like Rich can attempt to portray a hearing at which the nominee's blatant, in-your-face racism was challenged (for the most part feebly) by members of the opposition party as an event that showcased the opposition party's racism.
In the same column he insults black Americans and Republicans by describing Michael Steele as "the G.O.P.'s token black."
Rich is the same fellow who tried to incite hatred against conservatives in a recent column on the DHS report on "rightwing extremism."
You may also recall that it was the pathologically obsessive Rich who in 2004 couldn't help attacking President Reagan while he lay in state at the Capitol Rotunda. "Although mourners paying their respects to Reagan were often touted as representative of the entire nation, you could nod off counting the white visitors before a black person appeared." Rich argued that the massive outpouring of grief regarding Reagan was phony and that media coverage of the death strongly resembled the saturation coverage of O.J. Simpson's murder trial.
The fact that the Old Gray Lady keeps Rich on staff is just more proof that the newspaper left the news business long ago.
Updated: Yet more evidence emerges that Dick Cheney was justified in telling Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) to go f@*^ himself. Leahy, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee is a legendary, shameless, grandstanding race-baiter utterly unencumbered by any sense of decency. Yet Leahy lectured his committee's ranking member, Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama), on CNN for allegedly race-baiting. "Stop the racial politics," Leahy said. This is too rich (pun intended). During the hearings Leahy also misrepresented Sotomayor's "wise Latina" comment deliberately editing it to remove the context that made it offensive, as Ed Whelan pointed out on NRO. At the outset of the hearings Leahy also implied that mere criticism of Sotomayor's infamous statement that she 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," was in itself racist. This was a loathsome smear and an attempt to intimidate members of the opposition party. Leahy has got to be one of the slimiest politicians on Capitol Hill, and that's saying something.
Here is a link to the CNN video.
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More Blog Posts by Matthew Vadum
http://spectator.org/blog/2009/07/19/frank-rich-bigot-and-propagand
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Daisy| 7.19.09 @ 8:26PM
It's not about color, gender or ethnicity--it's about leftist ideology. Rich is just another Marxist liberal who wants power.
Todd| 7.19.09 @ 9:15PM
Frank Rich deserves the due coming him and his cohorts in the MSM..
I for one, want to ask the question..?
If, I were nominated for the Supreme Court of Our United States and said on record:
" I believe I would make a better decision than a Latino woman"...?
Would I even be allowed a Senate hearing...?????? Someone, please answer me..?
I thought not....
We are living in a time where deception rules... God Help Us ALL......
Mike Lee| 7.19.09 @ 9:29PM
Frank Rich and Maureen Dowd are just two of the reasons I stopped reading the pathetic excuse for a newspaper that the NYT has become. How much more of the bizarre & disturbed rantings of an aging queen and an angry feminist loner who just needs a date or something else. Talk about the ancien regime. I for one will not be sad when the Grey Lady is euthanized.
harsens-rob| 7.19.09 @ 9:46PM
Keep saying whatever you wish was true about the Times article, it doesn't change the fact that much of the 'questioning' from the old, saggy, white men on the panel was embarassing. I can't wait until these relics of the past are given their walking papers for new blood, new ideas, new ways of looking at the world. And, God! The bloviating of their 'opening statements'... jeez, just ask your stupid question and then close your mouth!
I swear every Senator is a self-important bag of noxious gas just waiting to erupt at the slightest provocation.
Tootsie| 7.19.09 @ 11:06PM
The old, saggy, white men or the bloated, pig faced "wise" Latina?
There seem to be a lot of self-important, noxious gas bags in Washington DC and more than enough embarrassment to go around.
tailgunner| 7.19.09 @ 11:53PM
"It's the American way that we judge people as individuals, not as groups. And by that standard we can say unequivocally that this particular wise Latina, with the richness of her experiences, would far more often than not reach a better conclusion than the individual white males..."
Am I the only one who sees Rich's amazing ability to hold two opposing positions at the same time, in the same paragraph?
First Rich says we judge people as 'individuals', not as 'groups'. Then he immediately turns around and repeats Sotomayor's obnoxious stereotypical groupthink.
It takes a fragile psyche to hold two positions at the same time...and believe in both of them.
Smitty| 7.20.09 @ 12:21AM
"Fragile psyche" is a euphemism for insanity.
Bob| 7.20.09 @ 5:54AM
Frank Rich: Asshole in Chief.
Andrew B| 7.20.09 @ 7:46AM
Hey, Frank Rich, want to REALLY nod off waiting to see a black face? Try attending a Broadway show. Oh, wait...you do...regularly. Oops, sorry.
(But then you know how racist those theater critics are.)
Grzmlyk| 7.20.09 @ 11:23AM
Back when he was a critic, the mere mention of Rich's name struck fear in the hearts of actors, producers, directors and anyone else associated with the theater.
He was considered the ultimate arbiter of shows that were to be anointed "worthy" and, therefore, he wielded the power of life and death over many a production. And so he elevated much human detritis and sewage to the level of art even as he condemned decent and faithful works to obscurity and oblivion.
He relished his power to destroy folks from his exalted (and undeserved) perch and has never been able to amass quite the same power as he struts foppishly on the world stage.
And so he's been chasing the dragon ever since, looking for people he considers lesser than he to destroy (i.e., he's ultimately a generic liberal).
In a just universe, this guy is a smoldering, charred ember by noon. When it comes to Hell's Hypocrite Elitist Hall of Fame, Rich (along with Dowd and virtually the entire odious Times staff) will have a bust in the lobby.
I say the sooner he's able to visit in person, the better for all of us.
Bob| 7.20.09 @ 11:43AM
Vadum, you really make me laugh. Sotomayor incompetent? Really? 4000 decisions and they are almost all centrist. The highest rating by all major lawyer groups. Top of her class in school. Even Ken Starr likes her. You would be far more believable if you didn't go off of the deep end.
As to the Ricci case, it was a 5-4 decision which, according to the analyses I've read, was a change in precedent (or the creation of a precedent).
Regarding the charges of racism, it is all in the eye of the beholder. I was raised in a poor black neighborhood and I can tell you that most of the people I grew up with would say that the Republican's questions were clearly racist. Having spent my life as a Republican, I can tell you that most of my right wing friends would call Sotomayor a racist. What is the truth? I don't think either side shows racism.
Furthermore, after having worked in NY for a number of years, I can tell you exactly was Sotomayor was doing with her "wise Latina" comment. She was a Bronx babe spouting off overstatements to other Latina women. When you hear blacks talking to other blacks in a black neighborhood, they talk differently than they would in public to white people.
So, Vadum, lighten up and smell the roses. What gets to me is that the real reason many Republicans wanted to derail Sotomayor is based on ideology. Why can't they be honest and just say so? Obama did that with Alito. Just say she is going to be too liberal and you don't want the balance of the court to go to the left. Instead, they play this game of overstatement which is just dumb.
I could make an argument that Alito was incompetent because ALL of his decisions that were ruled on by the Supreme Court were overturned. I could make an argument that Thomas as incompetent because he is the ONLY justice not to receive the highest rating from the ABA. I wouldn't have voted for Thomas, but I would have voted for Alito and, for that matter, Bork, because they were both competent.
There are a large group of Americans who agree with Rich. I'm sure they don't read TAS. But the fact of the matter is that Republicans, given the whiteness of the party, are most susceptible to racist arguments. It is hard to call a party where almost all of the blacks and 2/3rd's of the Hispanics reside as racist -- and it is thus a dumb political argument to make as you will always lose.
I suggest Republicans just say they don't like her ideology and won't vote for her. At least that is honest. You only hurt the Republican party by making the argument you do.
Grzmlyk| 7.20.09 @ 12:25PM
And, bobby, you should know all about dishonesty. You are something of an expert on the topic.
Why don't you just hire a parrot and teach it to say "Crawk! Bobby is the smartest person on the planet!!! Crawk!" That's really all you care about, anyway, and it'll spare us your uselessness. Like a typical liberal psedo-intellectual, the real-world ramifications of policy and the consequences of a government-gone-wild matter not one whit to you (despite the protestations you are preparing to the contrary). The world is your little playground and consequences be damned, eh? Oh I know, it must be sooo fwustwating that evwyone is so much dumber than you. Poor, poor little genius.
All of your diversions into arcane (and dubious) statistics and all of your condescending fillibustering are simply a smokescreen for feeding the maw of your insatiable ego. You may be a (dubious) statistics filled turd, but you are a turd nonetheless.
You are also a liar and a fraud. And if you ever ran a company, given your past comments, I have no doubt it's an ex-company by now.
What's the root cause of your bullying, bobby? Your mommy told you that you were the smartest person on the planet?
I guess it's really tough that all of us mere mortals - too stupid to recognize your brilliance and bow before your superior brain - haven't voiced our unanimous agreement with your mommy.
Hey, if you're so damned superior, instead of trolling on this Web site 24/7, why don't you go out and fix the world, big shot?
You don't come to to this site to exchage ideas; you come to inflate your cretinous, insatiable, creepy ego.
Why don't you take your precious GDP chart and go practice what you do best in the privacy of your basement?
Bob| 7.20.09 @ 12:40PM
Grzmlyk -- You don't need outbursts of anger just because the facts, logic, and analysis are not on your side. If my posts make you feel inferior, that is YOUR problem. But you are a typical right wing social conservative -- devoid of facts and operating totally on emotion.
Calling data from the Heritage Foundation "dubious" and "arcane" is just too funny. Why do you just want to hear the zealot side? Are you not secure enough to argue on the merits?
By the way, no one has posted any graphical data adjusted for inflation that refutes my arguments. Facts, I guess, are just stubborn things.
Have a nice day!!!!
Patriot| 7.20.09 @ 2:20PM
Look out! RINO Bob busted out a brand new pair of Obama knee pads today. Fatuous Bob, who claims to be a 'fiscal conservative', passionately defends Obama's leftist fiscal policies including Obama's 11+% unemployment numbers.
Some logic there somewhere, I guess.
Bob| 7.20.09 @ 3:21PM
Patriot (?) -- If you had studied economics you would have understood that saying that we will reach 11% unemployment has nothing to do with Obama's policies. I've said many times, that neither tax cuts or stimulus spending seems to make a BIG difference in the economic cycle. Monetary policy seems to have more effect. But the economic cycle is more tuned to private enterprise. What is it about that structure that you don't seem to understand.
The fact that you took the irrational position that I support Obama's spending when I was against the stimulus and the bailouts shows that you social conservatives live more by emotion than fact.
Matthew Vadum| 7.20.09 @ 4:36PM
Bob, wherever you go you make new friends as you share your enlightened view of the world. You must be retired to have so much spare time.
As for me, I was clear in my previous article about my objections to Sotomayor. See http://spectator.org/archives/2009/07/14/trumping-the-race-card. This blog post focused on Frank Rich's pontifications.
I see little evidence that Sotomayor has any particular judicial philosophy. In her testimony she pandered to the senators questioning her. And as Ed Whelan at NRO and others have documented, she is incapable of explaining many basic legal and constitutional concepts properly. She lacks the intellectual gravitas we have come to expect of Supreme Court justices. I may often disagree with Souter, Breyer, Ginsburg, Stevens, and Kennedy but I would never claim they lack intelligence. Sotomayor, on the other hand, is a bit of a dim bulb. She's nothing special and so shifty that in the opinion handed down in the Ricci case she refused to even offer ratio decidendi. How cowardly. The people of the United States deserve to be able to read and understand the principles underlying court decisions, but instead President Obama nominated a woman who already acts like a sneaky politician hedging her bets.
Many on the left have serious doubts about Sotomayor too. See
http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=45d56e6f-f497-4b19-9c63-04e10199a085.
She's been called a bully, domineering, and self-important. I suspect these descriptions only scratch the surface.
I have never claimed to speak for Republicans or to be able to read their minds.
Patriot| 7.20.09 @ 4:37PM
LOL!! Obama knee-pad boy, RINO Bob--it's getting harder and harder for you to keep up your RINO charade. With Obama's favorables tanking you look stupider by the day.
Patriot| 7.20.09 @ 4:39PM
Bully, domineering and self-important all describe RINO Bob perfectly.
Bob| 7.20.09 @ 5:12PM
Vadum, I read Whelan's remarks on Sotomayor. He bases the bulk of his opinion on the Ricci case but does not attack her intellectual capacity. He talks about the cases overturned by the Supreme Court, but fails to mention that ALL of Alito's cases reviewed by the court were overturned but not all of Sotomayor's were overturned. He also failed to mention that 3/4ths of all decisions reviewed by the high court are eventually overturned.
If you reviewed the testimonies of Roberts and Alito, I can find little difference between how they answered the questions and Sotomayor answered the questions. None of them revealed their judicial philosophies. In fact, not since Bork has anyone opened up.
As to intellectual capacity, you can't graduate summa cum laude from Princeton and lead the Law Review at Yale without some intellectual heft. In fact, Law Review at Yale is chosen on a BLIND basis.
I have heard from pundits that her opinions lack intellectual insights, but that goes along well with deciding by precedent.
Do I see evidence of intellectual brilliance? No, but I don't see brilliance in Alito, Thomas, and Souter either. Like I said before, the next nomination will be Elena Kagan and she is intellectually brilliant.
So Vadum, why don't you just stop with the rationalizations that make little sense, and just say you don't like her ideology. In truth, if she were a social conservative like Thomas with even less intellectual heft, you wouldn't be making the arguments you do.
As most of the senators realize, it only hurts them politically to be against this nomination unless they are in a safe conservative district. The issue for you and others is how she will vote on abortion, gay marriage, and other social issues -- not her competence.
And yes, I'm retired and this is fun.
Patriot| 7.20.09 @ 5:55PM
RINO Bob's a masochist, and it's a lot of fun to apply the verbal cane to his behind every day. Those Obama knee pads should be getting a little uncomfortable, though.
Matthew Vadum| 7.20.09 @ 6:21PM
Bob, if you don't see brilliance in Clarence Thomas's writings, you could not have read them.
Smitty| 7.20.09 @ 7:13PM
Bob is blinded by his Marxist ideology; he doesn't care about minorities, he cares about power.
Bob| 7.20.09 @ 8:11PM
Vadum, perhaps you can link to some "brilliant" writings of Clarence Thomas PRIOR TO BECOMING A SUPREME COURT JUDGE. As I understand it, and I am not an expert on Thomas, he had never written a book, article or brief of any consequence prior to his appointment to the Supreme Court. Please show me I am wrong. When you are on the high court, you have a cadre of the top legal graduates as clerks (all having done better than Thomas in school) to draft your briefs and provide thoughts.
Matthew, if you are going to make outlandish statements like that, you should be able to provide some support for them. Right?
Patriot -- you've got a verbal cane? You are a comedian. You are an intellectual star in your own mind.
Smitty -- Wonderful conclusion that I am a Marxist. You are a shining star of conservatism almost the equal of Joe the Plumber. Are you licensed? It's funny that those who know me best consider me to be a capitalist to the "n"th degree. Why else would I have worked for AIG? You don't work for Hank Greenberg if "power" is your trip -- believe me.
Smitty| 7.20.09 @ 11:20PM
"RINO" Bob, your libtroll gig is up--go back to your Axelrod astroturf freaks where you belong--in the toilet along with your Obummer.
Don't let the door hit ya where the Lord split ya!
Pingback| 7.21.09 @ 2:52PM
The Race Card » Blog Archive » Frank Rich links to this page. Here’s an excerpt: