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Sotomayor stays mum during Senate visits (Is Sonia PRO-LIFE? Oh, my.)
Sign On San Diego ^ | 6/02/09

Posted on 06/02/2009 4:44:55 PM PDT by Libloather

Sotomayor stays mum during Senate visits
By LAURIE KELLMAN, The Associated Press
3:55 p.m. June 2, 2009

WASHINGTON — Judge Sonia Sotomayor is not shy. By all accounts, her hearing is fine. But Sotomayor stayed nearly silent in public during her debut Tuesday on Capitol Hill under a guiding principle more associated with the practice of medicine than law or politics: Above all, do no harm.

"She's following the rules," said Tom Korologos, a longtime figure in Washington and veteran chaperone of Republican nominees to the high court, including William Rehnquist, later chief justice, and Robert Bork, who wasn't confirmed. "The White House instructs them to say nothing except to senators."

To that end, Sotomayor showed that she can follow directions, exhibiting a restraint for which nominees strive but don't always achieve.

She ignored even the most innocuous questions, refusing to issue even a thumbs-up when asked how she was feeling on her big day. At another point, Sotomayor shook her head no: she would not grant a reporter's request to give a sound bite in Spanish. Another scribe tried and failed to provoke her into commenting on the charge by conservative commentators that she was a racist.

She even remained composed when Majority Leader Harry Reid referred to her as "the whole package" and thrice invoked the word "dog" to describe her – twice as an "underdog" who rose through the Ivy League and the judiciary to become "top dog."

Exercising the right to remain silent is inherently a political and pragmatic strategy during the confirmation process. The less said by the nominee, the lower the risk of making an offhand remark that might upstage senators who will decide her fate, or jeopardize her confirmation outright.

(Excerpt) Read more at 3.signonsandiego.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Extended News; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: abortion; judge; obamasdog; prolife; sonia; soniasotomayor; sotomayor
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RUSH: I have one exception to my objection to Sonia Sotomayor. I am not retracting that she will bring racism and bigotry to the court if she is confirmed. However, there might be mitigating factors that might convince me to overlook that. Well, what do we know about her? We know she's Catholic. We also know she has no record on abortion. Sonia Sotomayor being Catholic and having not said a word about abortion, I find that interesting. All libs who want to go anywhere in liberalism are pro-choice and they make no bones about it, she hasn't said a word about it, which could mean that her private feelings are she's pro-life. If I could be convinced that Sonia Sotomayor might be the biggest hope for overturning Roe vs. Wade down the line, then I might be persuaded to look at her nomination in a different light. I'm serious.

I'm dead serious. I'm dead serious. Life, preserving life, to me, is a far more important issue -- we can deal with the racism and the bigotry, that can be canceled out by other justices and so forth. But I mean if you believe in life as I do and the sanctity of life, the more judges on the court we could get that are pro-life and might look at Roe vs. Wade as the bad law that it is and this is an open question about Sonia Sotomayor, 'cause she hasn't said anything about it. And that's rare for a doctrinaire liberal to be silent on this. She's not silent on any other aspect of liberalism from the multicultural curriculum, but she hasn't done anything officially on abortion. We know she's Catholic, Puerto Rican Catholic. It's just something to look at here.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: I misspoke on Sonia Sotomayor and abortion. She came out, she affirmed that there should not be US funds for international abortions. I misspoke. I said she did. I'm going to have to research this to be sure, but I think she's come out and said there should not be US funds, international agencies that promote abortion. Now, given that, there may be something lurking here beneath the surface that we are all unaware of. So on that basis I could be made to support this nomination, if I could be convinced -- and I don't know if I could be -- but if I could be convinced that she's pro-life.

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_060209/content/01125111.guest.html

1 posted on 06/02/2009 4:44:55 PM PDT by Libloather
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To: Libloather

If she is I am sure she wont admit it.


2 posted on 06/02/2009 4:47:22 PM PDT by markedmannerf
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To: Libloather

I said on another thread that’s the only way she won’t get the seat, if she’s Pro-life. She’d never make it out of committee.


3 posted on 06/02/2009 4:50:32 PM PDT by Kent C
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To: Libloather
Rush said he might accept her if she's pro-life. What if it never comes up while she's there? Are we willing to accept one socialist/liberal decision after another on the off chance she "might" be pro-life?

Her decisions could affect literally hundreds of millions of people. Is the chance worth it?

4 posted on 06/02/2009 4:57:44 PM PDT by raybbr (It's going to get a lot worse now that the anchor babies are voting!)
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To: Kent C

I think this ‘is she pro-life’ stuff is nothing more than a political stunt created by Dims to quell any possible Republican rebellion against her. There’s no way The Zero would appoint a pro-life justice. This issue is a fake, a diversion.


5 posted on 06/02/2009 4:58:49 PM PDT by joejm65
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To: Libloather

well, well, well, isn’t that interesting. I pray that she is pro-life. That will make some leftists heads explode.

jw


6 posted on 06/02/2009 4:59:59 PM PDT by JWinNC (www.anailinhisplace.net)
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To: joejm65

I second that.


7 posted on 06/02/2009 5:03:28 PM PDT by tommyboy
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To: Libloather

Obama made her eat a fetus before he even considered her.


8 posted on 06/02/2009 5:08:10 PM PDT by exist
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To: raybbr

“Rush said he might accept her if she’s pro-life. What if it never comes up while she’s there?”


Yeah, the U.S. Supreme Court is unlikely to hear any abortion cases in the next 30 years. It’s not a controversial issue or anything.

That being said, there is no chance in hell that Sonia Sotomayor would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade or even in favor of restrictions on abortion. How do I know that? Because she was nominated by Obama. While GOP presidents are so concerned with not asking improper questions and thus often screw up and nominate judges that are secretly liberal, Democrats *do not* make mistakes of that nature. The last non-liberal Justice to sneak past a Democrat president was Byron White, back in 1962 or so (he was nominated by Kennedy).


9 posted on 06/02/2009 5:12:29 PM PDT by AuH2ORepublican (Fred Thompson appears human-sized because he is actually standing a million miles away.)
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To: joejm65
I think this ‘is she pro-life’ stuff is nothing more than a political stunt created by Dims to quell any possible Republican rebellion against her.

I do too and I think it may have been Rush's ploy to reverse it on them. Imagine a news story about "a close friend" that swears she's pro-life, and it was made credible by the SRM (State Run Media - Rush's excellent enhancement on MSM). Diane Feinstein would vote for machine gun rights before confirming her, if she thought that there was a possibility of it.

10 posted on 06/02/2009 5:17:33 PM PDT by Kent C
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To: markedmannerf
If she is I am sure she wont admit it.

If she is, then she lied to the Liberal Messiah. There's no way He didn't ask her about her views regarding abortion or that she told Him she was pro-life. It will be interesting to see if staunchly pro-choice Senators will vote for her if this uncertainty is still in place.

11 posted on 06/02/2009 5:20:30 PM PDT by Repeal 16-17 (Let me know when the Shooting starts.)
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To: raybbr
Is the chance worth it?

If it walks likes a duck, quacks like a duck, has a flat bill, webbed feet, feathers, wings, and every outward attribute of a duck, and a gizzard inside, then it's a Duck. And if by some freak of nature it is also pro-life, then it's a dead duck in the committee.

12 posted on 06/02/2009 5:23:56 PM PDT by Kent C
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To: AuH2ORepublican
Yeah, the U.S. Supreme Court is unlikely to hear any abortion cases in the next 30 years. It’s not a controversial issue or anything.

Oh, yeah. That's right. It comes up almost every year.

13 posted on 06/02/2009 6:11:31 PM PDT by raybbr (It's going to get a lot worse now that the anchor babies are voting!)
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To: joejm65; Liz; AT7Saluki; writer33
I think this ‘is she pro-life’ stuff is nothing more than a political stunt created by Dims to quell any possible Republican rebellion against her. There’s no way The Zero would appoint a pro-life justice. This issue is a fake, a diversion.

She came out, she affirmed that there should not be US funds for international abortions.

I dunno...

14 posted on 06/02/2009 7:56:10 PM PDT by Libloather (Tea Totaler)
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To: Libloather
Honestly, this may be nothing more than a rookie mistake on Obama's part. Sotomayor is the kind of 'enlightened' judge that Obama would favor, and is female and Hispanic, which made her a natural front runner.

But just as he didn't thoroughly vet Turbo Tax Tim or any number of other appointees, I think it's pretty clear that Obama isn't great at doing his homework.

The great compounding factor here is that Obama can't admit that he's wrong, and he can't throw her under the bus because he just put her in the driver seat. Unless she shows up wearing an Operation Rescue t-shirt to the confirmation hearing, she'll sail through committee, sidestep any tough questions and waltz into the nomination.

I don't know that she's a closet pro-life or closet pro-choice, only that her views are so close hold as to be unknown, and impossible to divine at this stage. For either party.

15 posted on 06/02/2009 8:07:23 PM PDT by Steel Wolf (Oh, well. Back to the drawing board....)
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To: joejm65

Defeating Sotomayor would be a boost to 0bama, who could then justify installing an even more radical Justice for her replacement.

Moreover, Sotomayor ruled in favor of Reagan and Bush’s Mexico City anti-abortion policy...one of her only rulings on abortion.

It’s also worth remembering that Sotomayor was first appointed by Bush, Sr. who, although he certainly made judicial mistakes, also gave some conservative vetting of her.


16 posted on 06/02/2009 8:13:32 PM PDT by Southack (Media Bias means that Castro won't be punished for Cuban war crimes against Black Angolans in Africa)
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To: Libloather

Agreeing that the U.S. shouldn’t fund abortions in Mexico doesn’t make her pro-life. It means she ruled on one case involving abortion. She was nominated for her empathy and her life story, and part of her life story involves growing up in the Bronx and probably watching a lot of young minority girls getting pregnant. Since the president feels that a child can be a burden, I have no doubt that he’d nominate someone who shared the same view.


17 posted on 06/02/2009 8:32:06 PM PDT by joejm65
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To: Libloather

she has said a few crazy things, and made a few bad rulings, BUT
pro life is a definite possibility.
She was a prosectuor and almost all prosecutors hate criminals, just like most of us.
She did do international business law and most of them hate regulations.
She was nominated the first time by 41 (ya 41 got souter wrong, but he got a lot right as well).
All in all there is a small chance ZerO will regret she was nominated.


18 posted on 06/02/2009 8:41:59 PM PDT by genghis
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To: Libloather
If the left starts to really believe that she's pro-life, you'll see her gone so fast it will knock her compelling life story into orbit.
19 posted on 06/02/2009 8:57:39 PM PDT by Question_Assumptions
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To: Question_Assumptions
If the left starts to really believe that she's pro-life, you'll see her gone so fast it will knock her compelling life story into orbit.

Conversely, if she isn't booted, it will very strongly imply that any implication that she may be pro-life is a smokescreen.

20 posted on 06/02/2009 9:43:02 PM PDT by supercat (Barry Soetoro == Bravo Sierra)
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