Sotomayor

Obama's Pick from the Start

First topped his list in November.

President Obama may have teased us with other possibilities, but it seems like Sonia Sotomayor was his choice for the Supreme Court all along. According to Marc Ambinder, Obama held a meeting in November shortly after the election to discuss Court nominees. Sotomayor topped the list at that meeting. Obama was willing to let his advisors talk him out of it, but apparently they loved her. “The pick, they believed, would tell a story about justice in the 21st century. Her hard-scrabble upbringing, combined with her tough-as-nails realism, combined with her respect for the rule of law, combined with her academic achievements, combined with her—yes—identity as an Hispanic female—provides a walking, talking counterpoint to the clubby formalism of the modern Supreme Court. … To liberals, the pick sells itself—a progressive superstar with fantastic academic credentials. Obama is addressing conservatives only because he wants to get his judge confirmed by a wide margin. To the rest of the country, the Sotomayor pick will embody Obama's judicial philosophy -- going beyond theory to, as the talking points say, ‘ensure consistent, fair, common-sense application of the law to real-world facts.’”