JAPAN NEWS AND DISCUSSION
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1
To be healthy, live in the big city
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Japan's nuclear safety standards flawed, says commission chief
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3
Teacher nabbed for using miror to peek up girl's skirt
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4
From carnivores to herbivores: how men are defined in Japan
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5
Why do Japanese change their attitude when they communicate with foreigners?
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- English Instructor (Osaka, Kyoto, Kobe)
- Berlitz Japan, Inc. (ベルリッツ・ジャパン株式会社), Kansai
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- FT English Teachers for Kids - Osaka
- Kohgakusha Co., Ltd. （株式会社興学社）, Osaka
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- Translator
- ZAIHON, Inc. (日本財務翻訳株式会社), Tokyo
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SezWho2
teleprompter,
I'm sorry about the misspelling. I occasionally remind myself to proofread and it's usually after an incident such as this. The extra "l" has no meaning other than clumsy typing.
Posted in: Sotomayor says she chose word poorly in 2001 speech
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SezWho2
telelprompter,
More nearly, almost always.
I think you lost your argument almost halfway into your first full sentence. You don't really want to talk about the issue. You want to talk about Left and Right, intellectually bankrupt constructs if there ever were any.
I think you cemented the loss when you posited a contempt for the Constitution on the part of people who have a different judicial bent than you would like. And without the contempt, there can be no attempt to camouflage it. Your accusation is without merit.
I don't think legal works are ever prescient. The people who draft them sometimes are, but not the works themselves. The Constitution is a fine document but it does not become any finer by decorating it with inappropriate adjectives.
As for "specious, post-modern theorizing which which basically seeks by an a priori process to absolve themselves of their lust for power,...etc...", that's a nifty string of words, but it doesn't mean much. An example would have been much more powerful. The Constitution provides for the Supreme Court and provides for it to determine the Constitutionality of certain matters (exercise: where's the lifetime appointment?). Importantly, however, it does not prescribe how the justices are to render their decisions.
Justices recognize the importance of precedent. That is why the Court recognizes the principle of stare decisis, a principle that many people are in a lather to upend in the case of Roe vs. Wade. The court does not operate by whim. It operates through Constitution, law, precedent and, inevitably, through individual justices consulting their own understandings of what the framers intended for our society and, equally inevitably, through the personal prejudices of those justices.
It doesn't matter whether those prejudices are held by a white man or a Latina woman. They're still prejudices. And we have nine Justices so that those prejudices can be held in check.
Posted in: Sotomayor says she chose word poorly in 2001 speech
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SezWho2
teleprompter,
I really can't help it if you can't express your thoughts forcefully.
Radicals (and reactionaries) define themselves by seeking unchanging interpretations of old documents. Unless you want our justices to call balls and strikes based on a fixed and unyielding strike zone, you are amenable to giving them some latitude in how they interpret the Constitution. Once you do that, you are lost because in order to protect your interests you will seek to grant latitude here but to withhold it there.
If you have a difficult time believing that I am a US citizen, you must live in a constant state of disbelief as you travel the streets and highways of America. As far as I can see your disbelief seems to be based on the fact that you and I disagree. I think you will find that you are at odds with quite a few of your fellow citizens.
As for the goddamned piece of paper, I don't believe that I asserted that Bush said it. I think you are defending against something that wasn't said. A little over-sensitive, perhaps. I certainly didn't hear Bush say it. I don't need to believe it or disbelieve it. I only watched as Bush interpreted the Constitution from the White House.
Apparently you feel more comfortable with one man telling us what the Constitution says than you do nine justices conferring, discussing and voting on what it says. Not me. That's why the Supreme Court is there in the first place.
Posted in: Sotomayor says she chose word poorly in 2001 speech
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SezWho2
So, I've asked the question why people consider Sotomayor to be a racist and I've heard no answer. However, I've heard plenty of people say that she said Latina woman and white man in the same sentence and that makes her a racist in her words. I don't think they could be more wrong.
Try this exercise: In the Sotomayor quotation substitute white man for Latina woman. Go ahead. Try it. If you do, you will clearly see that Sotomayor was talking about wisdom and first-hand knowledge of the subject under discussion.
What she was saying was that a person, even a woman, even a Latina, could render more sensible judgments than those of the run-of-the-mill justice if they had wisdom and experience to bring to the situation. Politics always has been and always will be identity politics. The best that we can hope for is that we have insightful and honest justices who will protect the American identity.
Supreme Court Justices are not umpires. They're not calling balls and strikes. They have three jobs--the least of which is to determine whether someone did or did not break the law. Beyond that they must determine whether the law itself is Constitutional. To do that, they must determine what the Constitution means for us today.
We change. And our interpretation of the Constitution must change with it until it becomes apparent that some change is needed in the Constitution itself. Otherwise, we become slavishly devoted to a centuries old and static interpretation of a goddamned piece of paper--kind of like a real American Taliban.
Posted in: Sotomayor says she chose word poorly in 2001 speech
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SezWho2
skipthesong,
In the New Haven case she did not side with blacks over Hispanics. As I understand it what she did was to support the city's decision to remove a written test as a basis for advancement. The city had rules for the test, for the weighting of the test and for mandating the selection to be one of the three highes scorers. Those rules did not comply with EEO guidelines. Application of city rules prior to their revocation would have produced the result that out of around 50 candidates, about half of whom were white with the others being black or Hispanic in not too disparate proportion, only 1-non-white would have been eligible for promotion.
Posted in: Sotomayor says she chose word poorly in 2001 speech
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SezWho2
Who said anything about guilt?
Posted in: Sotomayor says she chose word poorly in 2001 speech
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SezWho2
Sotomayor may have said that she chose her words poorly, but that isn't documented here. What is documented here is that the White House suggests that she should say that she chose her words poorly. I would hope she has enough integrity, however, not to be mincing about her previous comments unless she truly believes she did choose them poorly.
Posted in: Sotomayor says she chose word poorly in 2001 speech
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SezWho2
Wolfpack,
How is Sotomayor's decision in the firefighter's case racist? The fact is that we cannot treat people equally or impartially. That just isn't possible. We can endeavor to treat people fairly, however, and that was at the crux of the firefighter's case--whether it was fair to use a test-based system which comprised 60% of the decision, guided by a rule that says that every promotion must go to one of the three top scorers.
Also how are Sotomayor's remarks racist. She said that she hoped a wise Latina woman with an experience of discrimination issues would reach better decisions than a white male without such experiences. You have to go 'round Robin Hood's barn to make that racist.
Posted in: Sotomayor says she chose word poorly in 2001 speech
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SezWho2
Yes, Condi would have moved heaven and earth. Except she didn't.
Posted in: National security adviser: U.S. safer under Obama
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SezWho2
Well, I strongly believe that judges should rule on what is in the Constitution. For Supreme Court justices, that is exactly what they often have to do.
That is the question: what is in the Constitution?
Posted in: No filibuster, but Sotomayor battle still looms
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SezWho2
"Not that smart". She did, however, graduate summa from Princeton and was an editor at the Yale Law Review. I'm not sure who the law clerk was (and Jeffrey Rosen didn't say) and why the clerk had it in for her (although Rosen assures us that it could not possibly have been personal). However, one of the most telling sentences of the article is where the author says:
At least he was honest.
Posted in: No filibuster, but Sotomayor battle still looms
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SezWho2
Apples and oranges. An individual's expectation of whether a thing will or will not happen is largely independent of their value judgment of whether or not it is good for it to happen.
The same poll shows that only 29% say she should not be confirmed. It's a relatively safe bet that her confirmation is expected by many of those who say she should not, many of those who say she should, and many who say they are undecided. This is particularly true since no one so far has enunciated a compelling reason as to why she should not.
With Harriet Miers the case was rather clear as to why she should not. Both sides of the aisle opposed and for different reasons. However, Miers lacked the essential gravitas necessary for the position. Not so, Sotomayor. There is yet no serious objection to her--save for the fact that she is Obama's nominee.
Posted in: No filibuster, but Sotomayor battle still looms
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SezWho2
I think we Americans have many devices to tell us what to think. Rush Limbaugh, for example, would be one. The NYT would be another. But if what you are saying is that Americans don't care what other people think, I believe many Europeans would agree.
It's a shame that General Jones has to waste his time refuting the spat fulminations of Cheney. However, he is addressing issues that will be raised at some point anyway. And the comparison between the two men could not be more stark--Jones with a lifetime of service to his country and Cheney with a lifetime of service to himself.
Posted in: National security adviser: U.S. safer under Obama
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SezWho2
I don't think there is any such track record. I'm fairly sure, however, that there are people who do not like 60% of her decisions.
Posted in: No filibuster, but Sotomayor battle still looms
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SezWho2
teleprompter,
That the Democrats fought the inclusion of the 14th Amendment in no way refutes the point that Republicans tolerated slavery.
When Sotomayor says that "our experiences as women and people of color affect our decisions," she is uttering a basic human truth. Be they black, white, Latino, Christian, Muslim or Jew, everyone's experiences affect their decisions.
When she goes on to add that she "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," the key words are "wise" are "experiences" not "Latina woman" or "white male".
Posted in: No filibuster, but Sotomayor battle still looms
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SezWho2
Now they do.
Posted in: No filibuster, but Sotomayor battle still looms
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SezWho2
Now they do.
Posted in: No filibuster, but Sotomayor battle still looms
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SezWho2
Sarge,
Whether Cheney congratulated Obama on his victory or not has nothing to do with whether he believes in the peaceful transfer of power. "One may smile, and smile, and be a villain." True in Shakespeare's fictional Denmark. True in our present-day USA.
Posted in: Don't call ex-Vice President Cheney a has-been
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SezWho2
LIBERTAS,
No that's not Cheney's strongpoint. He really does not believe in the peaceful transfer of power. It seems to me that it is discourtesy for the outgoing administration to mount a campaign against the incoming. The Constitution doesn't forbid this of course, but it is bad form.
Posted in: Don't call ex-Vice President Cheney a has-been
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SezWho2
That old chestnut! The observation, not Cheney.
I don't think that Obama was rebuking or scorning the seven-and-a-half years. I think he was saying that there was no connection between the seven-and-a-half years and Guantanamo. And I think he was further saying that if there is a connection, Guantanamo is more likely to spur further attacks than to prevent them.
I could plant marigolds in my front lawn to keep burglars away. An absence of break-ins would not indicate the effectiveness of marigolds as a deterrent.
Posted in: Obama, Cheney battle over Gitmo, terror policy