Glenn wrote, "A similar avenue of certain attack -- that Sotomayor said in a 2001 speech that a female Latina judge has experiences that can inform her view of cases -- is equally frivolous."

If this all that Sotomayor had said during this speech, it would indeed be a completely frivolous avenue of attack. What Sotomayor also said, however, was "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experience would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." There is context, of course--her comments leading up to this were, indeed, roughly what Glenn was saying; she was arguing against the idea that two impartial judges would always reach the same conclusion, regarldess of gender, race, or personal history--obviously a silly notion. However, the troubling part is that she claimed a *superior* status by virtue of her gender, ethnicity, and "richness of experience," as though being Hispanic and having grown up in poverty in the Bronx inherently confers superior judicial powers. Imagine how it would sound reversed--"I would hope that a wise white male would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a Latina woman." Pretty bigoted and dumb, right? Right.

That said, although it's an annoying comment that reveals an annoying mindset, Glenn is correct to state that any real objections to this G.H.W. Bush-nominated justice must come in the form of pointing to "bad" (however you define "bad") decisions that she's made from the bench. Like 99.9% of Americans--including all of the ones pontificating about her left-wing extremism--I'd never heard of Sotomayor until about 3 weeks ago and have no grounds on which to actually object to her nomination, which I suspect will be relatively painless. However, that particular quote of hers is a very stupid one and does deserve to be castigated.

Ah, I see that "I swear fealty to our new Latina overlords!" is the latest clever meme to impute that anyone who objects to the Sotomayor nomination (which I don't, even, so I guess it's "anyone who objects to anything Sotomayor has ever said or done") is sekritly afraid of dark-skinned people--or "woman of color," as Paul Daniel Ash so sonorously puts it.

It is certainly true that (most) white males and (most) Hispanic females are not similarly situated in American society, and I'm not sure where in my original letter I "pretend otherwise." And I certainly have no objection to Sotomayor's nomination/confirmation *on the grounds of gender or ethnic background.* Moreover, I also have no objection to her nomination on ideological grounds--as a liberal Democrat myself, I'm happy to see a liberal judge on the court.

What I *do* have trouble with is the idea that the different situation of Hispanic females and white males inherently produces *better* judicial decisions out of the former set. Yes, experience and personal history, to include gender and ethnic identity, informs judicial decisionmaking. This is neither a good nor a bad thing; it's inherent to the situation and there's nothing wrong with it. I object, though, to the idea that not only is there nothing wrong with it, but that it's a positive good. Even Sotomayor, elsewhere in the speech and in other speeches, has said that she too strives for impartiality--I would hope that none of you would think that impartiality is a bad thing in a judge! What she doubts (and I agree) is that judges can *truly* achieve impartiality. That's fine. What's not fine is saying that the partiality, so to speak, caused by being a Latina woman up from poverty, produces better decisions.

In conclusion, none of the accussations of racial paranoia or aggrieved-white-man-ism on my part have any grounding in reality.

Nobody, I presume, is objecting to the fact that the letters in the letters section of an article about Dr. Tiller's murder are about Dr. Tiller's murder (at least, I'm not). What I do find rather objectionable is that Salon has devoted at least five articles to this particular act of domestic terrorism, plus a number of War Room entries to the Tiller murder, while I cannot find a single mention of William Long, the soldier killed in another act of domestic terrorism.

Salon is quick to write about soldier-victims when the perpetrator of the injustice is the US military (e.g. soldiers killed in friendly-fire incidents that are covered up, or provided with criminally inadequate medical care). Exposing such misdoings is, of course, a key function of journalism and Salon is to be commended for the work they do in this regard. But it's somewhat troubling that they devote no coverage--none at all--to an instance of domestic terorrism in which two of the victims were soldiers. Balance, please?