It's because he is a kind of political Oreo cookie: Democratic on the outside, same-as-a-Republican on the inside. How can I say such an inflammatory thig? Look at Obama's support for Bush-era secrecy; for continuing Bush's surveillance state;

for keeping Guantanamo prisoners locked up; for protecting Bush-administration lawyer-felons who approved torture... the list goes on and on. There's a new cookie in town: the Ideological Oreo.

Obama should have gotten rid of Bushies at CIA and NSA, but he had no stomach for removing them. Or, to put it less charitably, he fully adopted Bush's policies on governmental privacy violations, secrecy, and detention, and kept much of the personnel. We heard pretty words, but Obama's ugly deeds have spoken much louder. This is why people should never fall in love with a politician.

The ones who oppose all tax increases and would have a veto power even if they comprised only 25% of the legislators. They, and Californians who are too mellow to do anything to fix this mess, are to blame. Sure am glad I don't live there.

I'm so fed up with Gov. Narcissus -- why can't the personal responsibility crowd tell him to shut up? Or does the personal responsibility speech only apply to welfare recipients and poor teenagers in need of an abortion?

"... that heartwarming personal bio shouldn't itself be a qualification for appointment to the highest court of the land."

Um, no one proposed that overcoming adversity alone was enough of a qualification.

"Many if not most Americans have relatives and ancestors who enduring privation and discrimination which they had to overcome to succeed. The point is that by declaring superior qualification by virtue or her ethnicity is both wrong and racist, pure and simple."

I know a mischaracterization of Mr. Greenwald's views and a straw man when I see it.

"The conservatives' criticisms of Sotomayor are not about her gender or ethnicity; they're about her performance and "entitlement" mentality, exemplified by her horrendous claim of superiority of judicial ability because of her being a Latina."

With all due respect, this is flat-out stupid in light of Sotomayor's years of experience as a prosecutor, civil litigator and trial judge -- experience which I believe none of the current justices had when they were appointed.

And what is this nasty slander du jour: "entitlement mentality'? It seems to me that it is conservative white males whose sense of entitlement has been impugned.

TNR Medley

Repub: Sotomayor might get chosen,

Let's pile on now, call Jeff Rosen.

He is as shameless as can be --

We can get word out anonymously!

Obama waits, he is frozen:

still there's no word Sonia's chosen.

Block her from getting her toes in

Let's call our buddy Jeff Rosen!

Repub: I like a column that's fact free.

Lib: I know a lawyer you should see.

Repub: He gets the lowdown on judges.

Lib: What he don't know he just fudges.

Repub: He hasn't read much that Sonia wrote.

Lib: Still he won't scruple to showboat.

Repub: He'll carry water for sources.

Lib: I won't lay odds on his horses.

(Too much more at sig.)

Let's not forget about fried codfish fritters: bacalaitos. I'd like to see those served in the Supreme Court kitchen. If Justice Sotomayor brings a batch of those in she'll have all the votes she needs.

...and for husbands who might want to veto a wife's decision to have an abortion. Alito has a touching solicitude for parties who traditionally have the upper hand. I'm sure he and Justice Roberts shed bitter tears when they review substantial products liability verdicts against manufacturers.

Thanks. You are a worthy, yourself.

The Atlantic’s “respectable intellectual center”

was spawned from a lazy, idle mentor:

one Jeffrey Rosen, who purported to tell

who will or won’t be a Justice from hell.

Without reading a word by the candidate

he had many salient points to relate.

First, the contender is fond of sangria,

dabbles in cockfights and santeria.

A legal philosopher whom Rosen found

in an ashram, who clerked for her once,

said Sotomayor could be glory bound,

were she not a total dunce.

Yet the judge was, at Princeton, summa cum laude -

editor of Yale Law Journal - who can explain this

between now and next Friday?

She was a grind, and those stellar grades,

mere “affirmative action accolades.”

One informant swore as follows:

“Sticking a pin in a white male dummy,

she made ten men cry out and run for their mummy.”

Here, in an attempt to cut the man some slack, is the crucial segment from an interview Obama gave Pasquino:

Q: Mr. Obama, what are your ’tentions?

A: My ’tentions are to have limited DE-tentions. Limited as in “just for terrorists". Ordinary folks need not apply! And normal people don’t have to worry.

Q: How can we be sure that no innocent people are detained? After all, there aren’t any hearings before the detentions...

A: For just that reason, we’re going to be very, very careful when we detain these terrorists.

Q: Will there be periodic reviews to make sure no mistakes have occurred?

A: Yes, every year, on May 1. That’s Law Day, so we thought that would be the most appropriate time to do these.

Q Mr. Commander-in-Chief, thank you very much.