Last week I described my sympathy for Obama in the face of the tremendous mess he inherited from the Bush Administration. But now that the president has chosen Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court, I have to admit to a keen sense of disappointment.
Two weeks ago I argued that Obama should nominate Pam Karlan for the Court. By almost all accounts, she has a sharper legal mind and would have been a more outspoken advocate for interpreting the Constitution in favor of citizen’s rights and the public good. But what bothers me most about Obama’s choice is that he apparently never seriously considered Ms. Karlan for the job.
No doubt his pick is great politics: choosing both a woman and a Hispanic will help strengthen his standing with these two large and important constituencies. I also admit that it will make great theater watching the right wing attack Sotomayor, only to lose even more standing with groups the GOP can ill afford to alienate. By nominating the first Hispanic to the Court, Obama may very well give the Democrats wider margins in the Hispanic community in 2010 and 2012 than he achieved last year.
Even so, and while I understand that no elected official is immune from political calculations, there comes a time when one must stand on principle. There seems little question that a nominee other than Sotomayor would have been more capable of countering the right-leaning Roberts-Scalia-Thomas-Alito wing of the Court. Yet Obama apparently settled on Sotomayor very early on, and scarcely considered outstanding candidates like Ms. Karlan and Diane Wood.
This is not to take anything away from Judge Sotomayor. She’s bright and capable, and may go on to become an excellent Justice. Assuming that Obama gets at least one more Court pick in the coming years, I hope he will nominate someone better suited to becoming a counterweight to the far right’s current ideological dominance.
The trouble is that I don’t want to keep waiting for next time. I want a president who stands up for what’s right now, both when it’s convenient and when it’s not, both when the economy is prospering and when it’s not.
I know it’s important to remind myself that Obama has been in office for only a few short months. Still I’m getting tired of hearing about consensus and bipartisanship, especially when it’s simply for the sake of consensus and bipartisanship. The Republican Party is no longer a serious political party; its elected leaders and self-appointed spokesmen (among them: Limbaugh, Gingrich and Cheney) spout hysterical nonsense daily, and show no real capability or interest in actually governing. Their views, such as they are, should have no sway in any major decisions made by either the President or the Congress.
I’m willing to give Obama considerable leeway, and I trust that most Americans will do likewise. But I hope that sooner, rather than later, he shows more backbone when it counts.
Jason Scorse