Sen. Lindsey Graham Falls For The Sexist Stereotyping Of Judge Sonia Sotomayor

Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, is falling for sexist stereotyping of Judge Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama’s nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court. Think of how exceedingly rare it is for men to be criticized as having temperament problems. It’s something you here frequently with women because they are supposed to carry themselves in a more docile and less aggressive fashion. It’s a shame Graham is still living in the gender-role dark ages with this tired stereotype. Graham has been a part of a sizable group of right-wing people running down Judge Sotomayor. He has not trashed her as bad as other right wingers, but it’s safe to question his ability to fairly judge her. All of the criticisms of her are based mostly on out-of-context statements and smears from anonymous sources (talking about her temperament).

GRAHAM: I believe she does have the intellectual capacity, but there is a character problem, there is a temperament problem.

Some Republicans continue to reach hard to blow anything out of proportion to find a way to derail Judge Sotomayor’s candidacy for the U.S. Supreme Court. It’s a shame Sen. Graham seems incapable of judging her by what he has seen with his own eyes and heard with his own ears. Instead, it seems the senator is more interested in anything negative from her – regardless of the source or the motive of the source.

Right wingers are reaching because they have very little real ammunition to use against Judge Sonia Sotomayor, who has a strong record and is a worthy candidate to replace the retiring David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Think Progress:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/03/graham-sotomayor-character/

Read the Think Progress story closely. At the end, the author posts a video where it seems Sen. Graham may have contradicted himself.

Barack Obama, Notre Dame Controversy Is About More Than Abortion, Catholicism

Conservatives are coming out of the woodwork trying to jump on the pile in attacking President Obama as a result of this Fox News-manufactured controversy surrounding his commencement address at the University of Notre Dame and his receiving an honorary degree from the institution. That being said, I started to read this column published on the Fox News Web site and written by Paul Kregor.

In May 1995, his first year as Pennsylvania governor, Tom Ridge was invited by Gannon University, a Catholic college in Erie, Pa., to give the commencement address and receive an honorary degree. But the distinguished Republican and native son had a problem: he was a pro-choice Catholic.

Erie Bishop Donald Trautman expressed his “concerns.” Governor Ridge declined the degree.
“The last thing I would want is for those differences to distract in any way from this wonderful day of recognition for Gannon’s class of 1995,” said Ridge. His spokesman explained that the decision “came from the governor.”

Ridge did the right thing. He did the character thing.

Ridge exercised his right to choose not to accept the degree (according to the information in this column). However, if anyone thinks the hatred would be any less intense toward President Obama had he turned down this degree is living in fantasy land. This is not about the honorary degree and I almost question whether it is even about the abortion issue for a lot of the people who are hating President Obama. People like Alan Keyes are pimping the University of Notre Dame for their own selfish purposes.

This whole issue is about the hatred of Barack Obama. Abortion, Notre Dame and all the other issues coming up are smokescreens. President Obama has done the character thing. He could have taken the easy way out and run away screaming or decided not to accept the degree. Both would have been, particularly in this case, cowardly. We should not give into a vocal minority playing the role of extortionist and emotional blackmailer. Ridge did what he felt was right and President Obama is doing what he feels is the right thing to do.

Bigotry thrives when people shy away from it.

Fox News:
http://foxforum.blogs.foxnews.com/2009/05/17/kregor_obama_notre_dame/