Senate Al Franken (D-MN) will be making an opening statement today in the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court of the United States. In other words, the Al Franken Decade is about to begin.

Franken up now.

This is an Open Thread.

Senator Whitehouse's opening statement was masterful, substantive, cerebral, historical and did honor to the Senate. He is truly becoming a great Senator. The statement on the flip:

Excellent work from Senator Feinstein.

Speaking for me only

While Kyl and the GOP Senators meander on (only Sessions has gone full frontal with his "Lost Cause" approach), Howie Kurtz twitted that no one pays attention to Senator Russ Feingold. Well, here at Talk Left, we do. Here is his opening statement, which was great:

Two decades ago, it was the NAACP. Today it is the PRDLF. Here is the video of Sessions admitting he did so from 23 years ago:

This morning, Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions (R-AL), attacked Judge Sonia Sotomayopr for being on the Board of Director of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense amd Education Fund. As Ian Millheiser noted, Jefferson Beauregard Sessions has a long history of opposing civil rights and groups that advocate for civil rights:

Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions said the following in his opening statment regarding the nomination of John Roberts to the Supreme Court:

[A]s you have already seen, our confirmation process is not a pretty site. Time and again, you will have your legal positions, your predecisional memoranda -- even as a young lawyer -- distorted or taken out of context.

These attacks are driven most often by outside groups. They will dig through the many complex cases that you have dealt with in an effort to criticize your record. They will produce on cue the most dire warnings that civil liberties in America will be lost forever if you're confirmed as a federal judge.

[MORE . . ]

This is the week that will make Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions (R-AL), ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, a Republican star. Here is the man that is the very embodiment of the Republican Party that emerged out of the Civil Rights Movement, the anti-everybody not a white male party. He is what the Republican Party is today - a reactionary, resentful, paranoid, white Southern male.

In the Sotomayor hearings, I will be watching for two things - (1) will Democratic Senators try to fight and win the framing wars on right wing judicial activism? (Sotmayor's confirmation is a foregone conclusion imo.); (2) Will Republicans allow (and Democrats encourage) the GOP image to be cemented as the party against women, Latinos, African Americans, Asians and "Others" - refighting "The Lost Cause"? The NYTimes provides a list of "experts" who point to other things to "look for":

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, asked whether criticisms of Judge Sonia Sotomayor's intelligence and attitude are gender-based, gave this spot-on answer:

I can’t say that it was just that she was a woman. There are some people in Congress who would criticize severely anyone President Obama nominated. They’ll seize on any handle. One is that she’s a woman, another is that she made the remark about Latina women. [In 2001 Sotomayor said: “I 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.”] And I thought it was ridiculous for them to make a big deal out of that. Think of how many times you’ve said something that you didn’t get out quite right, and you would edit your statement if you could. I’m sure she meant no more than what I mean when I say: Yes, women bring a different life experience to the table. All of our differences make the conference better. That I’m a woman, that’s part of it, that I’m Jewish, that’s part of it, that I grew up in Brooklyn, N.Y., and I went to summer camp in the Adirondacks, all these things are part of me.

The importance of judicial diversity is exactly the point conservatives refuse to acknowledge when they contend that only conservative judges (who not coincidentally are overwhelmingly white males) "follow the law." [more ...]

The Constitutional Accountability Center has an amusing catch of the National Review/Hoover Institution "scholar" Thomas Sowell betraying his ignorance in his zeal to argue for right wing judicial activism:

I think that the most interesting Justices, by far, were Justices Scalia and Thomas. Both remain the most principled members of the Court. . . . Justice Thomas, in particular, remained willing to front new theories on critical questions . . . No other member of the Court is so independent in his thinking. . . . I disagree profoundly with Justice Thomas’s views on many questions, but if you believe that Supreme Court decisionmaking should be a contest of ideas rather than power, so that the measure of a Justice’s greatness is his contribution of new and thoughtful perspectives that enlarge the debate, then Justice Thomas is now our greatest Justice.

(Emphasis supplied.) The SCOTUS as a "contest of ideas?" I would have thought that the traditional view was that contest was supposed to play out in the "political arenas." Is Goldstein conceding (and would conservatives concede) that the "appellate courts engage in policymaking?"

So much for the "umpire calling balls and strikes" ay?

Speaking for me only

I've written below urging the Congress to act to overturn the SCOTUS' judicial lawmaking in Ricci. The National Women's Law Center notes that the Obama Administration can also act. NWLC President Marcia Greenberger said, in part:

[W]hile today’s ruling diminishes employers’ ability to comply with anti-discrimination law, it does leave the door open for employers to act responsibly. As the Court recognized, employers are still obligated to take steps to remove both intentional discrimination and unjustified practices that adversely impact individuals based on their sex, race, national origin or religion. We call on the Obama Administration to issue guidance for employers on how to ensure that they offer fair promotional and job entry exams.”

(Emphasis supplied.) Good thinking from the NWLC. The Obama Administration also has a significant role it can play to dampen the effects of Ricci.

Speaking for me only

The Volokh Conspiracy's Ilya Somin makes a good point about today's Ricci decision:

The bottom line is that the business interests were among the big losers [in Ricci.] The Court's ruling makes it difficult for employers to use race-conscious measures to avoid disparate impact liability under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. . . . Although Ricci addressed promotion decisions by a government employer, the same Title VII standards apply to private employers too.

Below, I post about Arkansas AG Dustin McDaniel making the point that Ricci is damaging to government employers. Somin points out that it is also damaging to private employers. So on top of all the other serious flaws in the decision, add the fact that it hurts businesses to the list.

Speaking for me only