I'm debating Judge Sotomayor's nomination on MSNBC today at 11:10am EST with conservative writer J.P. Freire -- we've sparredbefore -- in a segment hosted by anchor David Shuster.
I will check out and respond to readers' input or ideas before and after the segment. The public debates over this pick have already careened into dark and dumb territory, so thoughts on how to elevate the discourse while beating back attacks are especially welcome.
As soon as this segment was booked, Shuster put guests on notice that he expects more substantive arguments than the identity attacks launched by some Republicans. Freire had cited Karl Rove's false claim that Sotomayor would be the second Latino on the bench -- shredded by diarists here -- and Shuster sent out this tweet:
@JPFreire You are on. Bookers will contact you and @arimelber. But JP, please bring better arguments then the lame Rove stuff.
There is another ploy circulating that sounds more substantive, but it also dissolves upon inspection. I'll pass the mic to law professor Jonathan Turley:
Claim: Sotomayor is a bad judge due to her reversals by the Supreme Court.
This claim is particularly bizarre, citing a 60 percent reversal rate. This is an example of how statistical analysis should be left to professionals and not attempted at home. Only five of Sotomayor’s opinions have been reviewed by the Supreme Court — not an unusual number given her 18 years on the bench. However, with such a small pool of cases, even a single decision going either way will have a huge impact on her "batting average." The reversal rate for all appeals is around 75 percent... If you review these cases, both Republican and Democratic appointed judges supported her side. They were not glaring acts of judicial activism, but matters of reasonable disagreement between jurists.
DavidNYC made a similar point this week.
Finally, there's The New Republic article with anonymous complaints about Sotomayor, although now that its author has retracted key claims and backed her nomination, it is an odd item for critics to cite. It doesn't work out very well, as the clip below shows. If the best sources the critics can find are from people who now back the nomination, so be it.
If you have further thoughts or ideas, again, just leave them in the comments and I'll respond from the studio or after...