XX Factor: the blog

Let Me Tell You a Thing or Two

Of all the stylistically tone-deaf things Sen. Lindsey Graham said to Sonia Sotomayor Tuesday, the worst was his declaration that he was going to tell a 55-year-old judge with 18 years of appellate experience how the world works. "I need to be sure that you understand the world as it really is," he said before launching into a lecture about how a comment analogous to her much-maligned "wise Latina" remark would have ended his career. Graham sounded truly aggrieved: "I just hope you will appreciate the world in which we live in, that you can say those things ... and still have a chance to get on the Supreme Court. Others could not remotely come close to that statement and survive. Does that make sense to you?"

Graham wasn't telling Sotomayor how the world works; he was telling her how his world works. But he conflated the two, making a statement about the standards set for his demographic-white males-out to be an assertion about the nature of the universe. Pretty rich, considering this hearing is supposed to be all about empathy.

Photograph of Lindsey Graham by Mark Wilson/Getty Images.

Comments

GOP Insensitivity

By: Ellementa | Wed, 07/15/2009 - 15:59

Sorry, the most insensitive comment (thus far) from the Senate hearings has to be Sen. Coburn's "You'll have lots of 'splainin' to do." What was he thinking? Did he believe that was funny? Would he tell a StepnFetchit Joke to Clarence Thomas? What an idiot!

I do agree that it is

By: xavieryeats | Wed, 07/15/2009 - 12:03

I do agree that it is disrespectful to tell another adult how the world works, but I think he was talking around an issue and was trying to be polite.

I think he was referring to the lead Republican, Sen. Sessions who was denied a seat on the Appellate bench for "rumored" racism. The comments, which I also believe to be given as a pep-talk to a Hispanic Women's group, emphasized the word "better." Civil Rights use to be about equality. But in her speeches she always refers to "better judgment."

More so, I think the more controversial and better discussion/debate would be Sen. Graham's comments that she would not be sitting here if a Republican had won; OR that given an alternative, the Republicans would have put Miguel Estrada on the bench to be the First Hispanic SCJ. (Almost implying that Sotomayor would not have been picked because the Hispanic spot was already filled.)

This, I feel, is the more controversial statement from Graham.