Affirmative Action

The far-right student group Youth for Western Civilization, which hosted a panel at CPAC on immigration featuring Rep. Lou Barletta (R-PA) and former Reps. Tom Tancredo and Virgil Goode, is now promoting the Confederacy’s 150th Anniversary and “Anglo-Celtic” pride. William L. Houston of YWC attended a ceremony commemorating Jefferson Davis’s inauguration, and discussed the need for ethnic and historical pride among the “native Anglo-Celtic population of the American South.” He went on to say that the federal government both under Lincoln and Obama are rightly “perceived as being out of control, hostile toward, and oppressive of the people of the states,” and concludes that the “common soldier of the Union Army could have only seen what has become of the Union in our own times, quite assuredly he would have laid down his arms and deserted to the other side.” Houston writes:

As far as heritage and ethnic pride events tend to go, they don't come more politically incorrect than the Southern Rights parade held by the Sons of Confederate Veterans in Montgomery on Saturday.

Before a cheering throng of hundreds of Anglo-Celtic Southerners, an actor portraying Jefferson Davis was sworn in as President of the Confederate States of America on the grounds of the Alabama State Capitol.

Confederate flags flapped in the Southern breeze. Dixie was played. Cannons were fired. There were speeches of defiance and rebellion - about events both historical and modern.

The purpose of this event was to remember and celebrate the birth of the Confederacy a hundred and fifty years ago. Yet everyone who gathered there left with the sense that there was more to the story.

This was a direct assault on the double standard of multiculturalism by "the wrong sort" of people - the only people in the United States who are denied a sense of pride and identity in their heritage - the native Anglo-Celtic population of the American South - who are told that every group in the world can come to the South and celebrate their heritage but the people who were born and raised here.

"What is it in a man that would cause him to deny his fellow man the pride and dignity of his heritage," said Chuck Rand, an adjutant in chief of the Sons of Confederate Veterans.

…

The crowd in attendence [sic] in Montgomery didn't hesitate to draw parallels between the Confederacy and contemporary America. Then as now, the federal government was perceived as being out of control, hostile toward, and oppressive of the people of the states.

In 1861, it was Southerners who felt this way. In 2011, it is the majority of Americans who live in the South, West, and Midwest.

In their worst nightmare scenarios, even the secessionists couldn't have imagined anything like the President of the United States attacking the State of Arizona for defending itself from a Mexican invasion, celebrating Kwanzaa and Cinco de Mayo in the White House, Obamacare, affirmative action, abortion, gay marriage, or Barack Obama's $3.7 trillion dollar proposed federal budget.

Even Abraham Lincoln would be flabbergasted at his modern heirs who have declared war on traditional marriage and Christmas celebrations. Nothing is more pointless than arguing over the causes of the Civil War.

If the common soldier of the Union Army could have only seen what has become of the Union in our own times, quite assuredly he would have laid down his arms and deserted to the other side.

Erick Erickson of the prominent right-wing blog RedState and a commentator for CNN hasn’t made any comments about the CPAC boycott controversy until now, attacking GOProud and its ally Grover Norquist for criticizing the Religious Right. GOProud’s leaders Chris Barron and Jimmy LaSalvia recently lashed out at social conservative leaders boycotting CPAC as “nasty, anti-gay bigots” in an interview with Metro Weekly, and Erickson is not happy about it:

I have done my best to stay out of this business, keep my mouth shut, and appreciate my friends on both sides of the CPAC divide. Had I not seen this particular attack by GOProud against long time solid conservatives I’d continue keeping my mouth shut. But this is too much. And my guess is that there aren’t many if any willing to call foul, so I will do it.

As someone who spent time trying to give them the benefit of the doubt, I accept this as conclusive proof that, while it is a Republican organization, GOProud is not a conservative organization.

…

You really should read the whole thing. You’ll learn that should you disagree with GOProud, you are a bigot too. In fact there are lots of delightful quotes. GOProud has taken one of the favorite leftist bullet points and brought it straight into CPAC. You oppose affirmative action? You’re a racist. You oppose gay marriage? You’re a bigot.

Wonderful trick. Sadly, it is being used on real heros within the conservative movement, including Cleta Mitchell, a board member of the American Conservative Union.

According to the dictionary, a bigot is a person “obstinately convinced of the superiority or correctness of [their] own opinions and prejudiced against those who hold different opinions.”

Chris Baron might want to look in the mirror.

…

While Cleta Mitchell was fighting for children, Chris Baron was signing up to work for the champions of child killing.

While Cleta Mitchell was fighting for people’s right to work, GOProud was aligning itself with the AFL-CIO and the SEIU.

While Cleta Mitchell was helping the Senate Conservatives Fund get people like Pat Toomey, Marco Rubio, Ron Johnson, Rand Paul, Mike Lee, and others elected, GOProud was attacking Jim DeMint.

While Cleta Mitchell was in super secret meetings of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy this week, GOProud was attacking Tim Pawlenty for daring to defend conservative positions on don’t ask-don’t tell.

Those groups and people who have sat out CPAC this year have done so not because they hate the gays, as Grover Norquist and GOProud would have you believe, but because GOProud is not a conservative organization and its agenda is not a conservative agenda.

For that, they are called losers and nasty bigots.

These losers and nasty bigots have done a lot more for the conservative movement than GOProud. And I am very happy to call them my friends.

This week, I’d much rather be with them than be at CPAC.

Writing about education for Townhall, Human Events, and WorldNetDaily, Pat Buchanan refers to the group VDARE to show the disparity between white students and students of color. Buchanan uses statistics from VDARE to show that “U.S. reading scores [broken down] by race,” and then cites VDARE writer Robert Weissberg to explain how “cognitive ability” explains the race gap in U.S. education.

VDARE.com is a White Nationalist group that warns of “America’s Darkening Future” where white Americans are the minority and embraces the “Sailer Strategy,” in which the Republican Party doesn’t reach out to minority voters and instead becomes the party of white America. VDARE writer Weissberg calls affirmative action a “racial spoils system” and blames problems in the education system on the “insufficient IQ of much of the population,” particularly blacks and Hispanics.

According to the review in the conservative magazine The New Criterion, Weissberg’s “book will gain most notice because of its claim that certain sections of the American population, namely the blacks and the Hispanics, have lower IQs than whites and Asians; that this difference is genetically determined; and that, since the Hispanics are becoming a larger proportion of the population, the average IQ in America is bound to fall.”

The Southern Poverty Law Center labels VDARE as a “White Nationalist” organization and says that VDARE “regularly publishes articles by prominent white nationalists, race scientists and anti-Semites.” SPLC reports that VDARE decries “the demise of white America, blaming immigrants, multiculturalists, and members of the ‘Treason Lobby’ — essentially groups concerned with protecting immigrants’ human and civil rights — for undermining the racial cohesion of the nation. Reflecting this position, VDARE.com’s archives contain articles like ‘Freedom vs. Diversity,’ ‘Abolishing America,’ ‘Anarcho-Tyranny — Where Multiculturalism Leads’ and ‘Why Immigrants Kill.’”

Buchanan’s use of his column to echo the overtly racist theories of an overtly racist group doesn’t seem to have bothered Townhall, Human Events, or WND. Will it bother MSNBC, which also gives Buchanan a platform as a pundit?

One of the points we made repeatedly in the posts we wrote on the Religious Right's militant opposition to expanding hate crimes legislation to include "sexual orientation" was that the Right never once complained during the decade when "religion" and "race" received federal protections.  It wasn't until protections for sexual orientation were added that they started screaming about supposed "special rights" and claiming that the legislation amounted to an unconstitutional threat to their religious liberty that would lead to pastors being tossed into jail. 

Of course, it has now been more than five months since this legislation was signed into a law and not a single pastor or religious leader has seen their religious freedom impacted in any way. 

Everything the Right said about expanding hate crimes protections was false and designed to scare people into opposing it ... and now groups like the Family Research Council are putting the same strategy to work in generating opposition to the Employment Non-Discrimination Act and raise money:

Do you think it's right for liberals running the government to ... 

• Force a Christian bookstore to hire a man . . . who dresses in women's clothing?
• Force your child's religious school to hire homosexual instructors?
• Force your employer to fire or censure you for what they call "anti-gay harassment" . . . for simply keeping a Bible on your desk?

That's the nightmare you could face if the Obama/Pelosi/Reid Congress passes the so-called Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA).

And that's why it must be exposed.  

... 

You are standing in the way of the Left's immoral vision for America. And laws like ENDA are intended for one thing-to silence your "obsolete" Christian morality and tear down all boundaries to unhealthy sexual behavior.

By sustaining your prayers and generous support of FRC, you're not only investing in the long-term health of faith, family, and freedom in America . . .

You're also strengthening the leading social conservative organization in Washington, D.C. Our respected team has decades of experience developing and blocking legislation, voicing the truth in and through the media, and mobilizing Americans.

Please join with other loyal FRC supporters in our campaign to expose ENDA by sending a generous, tax-deductible donation. 

 Of course, just as with hate crimes, the Right's claims are totally false:

What ENDA Does

• Extends federal employment discrimination protections currently provided based on race, religion, sex, national origin, age and disability to sexual orientation and gender identity
• Prohibits public and private employers, employment agencies and labor unions from using an individual's sexual orientation or gender identity as the basis for employment decisions, such as hiring, firing, promotion or compensation
• Provides for the same procedures, and similar, but somewhat more limited, remedies as are permitted under Title VII and the Americans with Disabilities Act
• Applies to Congress and the federal government, as well as employees of state and local governments

What ENDA Does Not Do

• Cover businesses with fewer than 15 employees
• Apply to religious organizations
• Apply to the uniformed members of the armed forces (the bill doesn't affect the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy)
• Allow for quotas or preferential treatment based on sexual orientation or gender identity
• Allow a "disparate impact" claim similar to the one available under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Therefore, an employer is not required to justify a neutral practice that may have a statistically disparate impact on individuals because of their sexual orientation or gender identity
• Allow the imposition of affirmative action for a violation of ENDA
• Allow the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to collect statistics on sexual orientation or gender identity or compel employers to collect such statistics.
• Apply retroactively

ENDA does not "force" anyone to hire or fire anyone, it simply extends anti-discrimination protections in the workplace to cover sexual orientation and gender identity. 

Just as with hate crimes, anti-discrimination protections for things like religion have existed for decades and the Religious Right never once complained about the fact that Christians were receiving "special rights" ... but now that there are efforts to ensure that sexual orientation receives similar protections, it is proof that liberals are out to silence Christians.

The other day we noted how Houston mayoral candidate Annise Parker was coming under attack from right wing anti-gay activists, among them Steve Hotze, who was a backer of Mike Huckabee's presidential campaign.

Now it looks like other Huckabee supporters are getting in on the act as well. As Towleroad reports, Rick Scarbrough of Vision America has sent out this email to Texas activists warning that Parker and others want "to recruit children to their lifestyle"::

Houston is facing the most critical city elections in its history. As a minister of the Gospel and a concerned former citizen of Houston, whose children and grandchildren live there, I am writing this letter to warn you of the devastating consequences which may occur if you overlook the threat which the December 12th runoff elections pose for the city of Houston. You will have two choices when you vote.

The Houston Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgendered (GLBT) Political Caucus has fielded a slate of endorsed candidates in the City of Houston Runoff Elections. They are searching the city for votes for their candidates and if successful, Houston will become increasingly like the city of San Francisco.

The Houston Gay Lesbian Bisexual Transgendered (GLBT) Political Caucus Slate

Mayor – Annise Parker
City Controller – Ron Green

City Council Races:
District A – Lane Lewis
District F – Mike Laster
At Large Position 1 – Karen Derr
At Large Position 2 – Sue Lovell
At Large Position 5 – Jolanda Jones
HISD School Board Position 1 – Alma Lara
HISD School Board Position 9 – Adrian Collins

Money is pouring in from homosexual groups around the country who want Houston to become the San Francisco of the South.

The Homosexual Agenda

1. Legalize same sex marriage.

2. Mandate public acceptance of the homosexual activities.

3. Teach homosexuality to school children, starting in kindergarten, as an acceptable, alternative lifestyle. This is known as multisexualism. This enables homosexuals to recruit children to their lifestyle.

4. Lower or remove age of consent laws leading to relaxation of laws prohibiting pedophilia. See www.nambla.org /

5. Elevate homosexuals to a minority class, leading to affirmative action for homosexuals in the workplace. Cross dressers could force employers to accept their actions at work.

6. Prohibit any speech which opposes homosexual activity. This would be considered “hate speech” and have criminal sanctions. This would destroy 1st Amendment free speech rights for those who oppose homosexual conduct and the homosexual political movement.

7. Require employee benefits to be provided to same sex partners.

8. Elect candidates to office who will work to implement the homosexual agenda.

If you DO NOT support the homosexual agenda and do not want Houston to become another San Francisco, then please consider voting for the following candidates:

Recommended Slate of Candidates

Mayor – Gene Locke
City Controller – M.J. Khan

City Council Races:
District A – Brenda Stardig
District F – Al Hoang
At Large Position 1 – Stephen C. Costello
At Large Position 2 – Andrew C. Burks, Jr.
At Large Position 5 – Jack Christie
HISD School Board Position 1 – Anna Eastman
HISD School Board Position 9 – Lawrence Marshall

If people who hold to traditional values neglect to vote in this election, the results will be far reaching. The above list of candidates is not perfect by any measure, but I strongly recommend them over the alternative. This election illustrates like few others why good men and women must stay engaged as concerned citizens.

“All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.” – Edmund Burke

Please forward this to your family and friends on your e-mail distribution lists.

Respectfully,

Dr. Rick Scarborough
President of Vision America Action

Back in 2005, it was reported that Tony Perkins, now President of the Family Research Council, "paid former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke $82,500 for his mailing list. At the time, Perkins was the campaign manager for a right-wing Republican candidate for the US Senate in Louisiana."

Shortly thereafter, FRC released a statement refuting the assertion:

Tony Perkins was the manager of the 1996 U.S. Senate campaign of Republican Woody Jenkins in Louisiana where Impact Media was contracted to make pre-recorded telephone calls for the campaign. In 1999, an unrelated federal investigation uncovered that David Duke had a financial interest in the company, which he did not report to the IRS, resulting in his conviction on federal tax evasion charges. This connection was not known to Mr. Perkins until 1999. Mr. Perkins profoundly opposes the racial views of Mr. Duke and was profoundly grieved to learn that Duke was a party to the company that had done work for the 1996 campaign.

A year later, it was reported that on two occasions, Perkins had addressed the racist Council of Conservative Citizens:

The Boston Herald reported in an October 16, 2006, article, "In 2001, [Perkins] gave a speech at a meeting of the Council of Conservative Citizens, which the Southern Poverty Law Center [SPLC] considers a hate group." Indeed, a Fall 2004 article in the SPLC's Intelligence Report asserted that Perkins "spoke to the Louisiana Council of Conservative Citizens on May 19, 2001," during his tenure as a Louisiana state legislator. The SPLC characterizes the CCC as a "white nationalist" organization, and has reported that the group is "the reincarnation of the racist White Citizens Councils of the 1950s and 1960s." The CCC declares in its statement of principles:

We also oppose all efforts to mix the races of mankind, to promote non-white races over the European-American people through so-called "affirmative action" and similar measures, to destroy or denigrate the European-American heritage, including the heritage of the Southern people, and to force the integration of the races.

In a July 30, 2005, article, The Vancouver Sun reported that Perkins acknowledged his speech before the CCC in an interview. The Sun also reported that Perkins claimed he could not recall what he said to the group and that he said he had been unfamiliar with the CCC's history at the time. From the Sun article:

The magazine [The Nation] also reported that Perkins, while a Louisiana state congressman, spoke in 2001 to the white supremacist Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC).

Perkins said he was invited by a constituent to speak to the group, and said he wasn't aware of its history.

"Never spoke to them again. That was over a decade ago," Perkins told The Sun, suggesting the speech happened in 1996, not 2001.

The Southern Poverty Law Centre, which keeps track of politicians close to the CCC, forwarded The Sun a March-April 2001 copy of Citizens Informer, the newsletter put out by the CCC, which included the following notice:

"The Louisiana CofCC met at the Mandarin Seafood in Baton Rouge May 19 to hear State Representative Tony Perkins discuss the current legislative session. At that meeting a recruitment project was developed."

When informed of the item by The Sun, FRC spokesman J.P. Duffy does not dispute the assertion that the event happened in 2001, not 1996, but added that Perkins "cannot remember speaking at the event, as he speaks to hundreds of groups each year." Duffy added that Perkins opposes racial discrimination and offered the names and phone numbers of two black pastors who support him.

Since Perkins claims that he "cannot remember speaking at the event," maybe this photo that recently surfaced online will help to jog his memory:

After disrupting yesterday's hearing, anti-choice protesters affiliated with Randall Terry are vowing more action:

Next on the agenda:

"Desecrate Roe" Event Details---

Where: Corner of 1st and C St., near Dirksen Senate Building entrance, Washington D.C.

When: 9:00 A.M., Tuesday, July 14

Who: Norma McCorvey, Randall Terry and other DC area leaders and pro-lifers

Pro-life advocates will gather at the Dirksen building at the corner of 1st and C St., to publicly desecrate the Supreme Court's Roe vs. Wade decision. Joining her will be Randall Terry, Missy Smith, and other local pro-life leaders.

Randall Terry states, "Victory over child-killing requires courage and leadership from 'pro-life' Senators from both parties. It is long overdue for so called 'pro-life' Senators to fulfill their campaign promises. They claim they want to overturn Roe; well, now is the time to see if they will defend the babies, or submit like cowards to Obama.

"Republican 'Pro-life' Senators bear special responsibility in this; they shamelessly prostitute Roe vs. Wade and babies lives. Does 'GOP' stand for 'Good Ol' Pimps'? Or will GOP Senators actually fight in this life and death struggle? They need to filibuster Sotomayor."

Will there be more arrests? To be seen...

Not to be outdone, Eugene Delgaudio and Public Advocate plan to be descend on Capitol Hill to create their own scene:

"Public Advocate's Sotomayor's UnReality Tour" arrives in Washington Tuesday to show what a world according to Judge Sonia Sotomayer would look like if she were a Supreme Court judge.

Lifeguards who can't swim. A doctor who flunked med school. A 3rd grade university president. Blind train conductors. Cooks who can't boil water. Lawyers who did not pass the bar exam but who are now judges.

Demonstrators will hold a sign "Sonia Sotomayor, Wrong on the firemen, wrong for America." Another member of Public Advocate will hold a sign with the words "Thanks to Sonia Sotomayor, I flunked med school and am now a doctor."

In related news, Randall Terry continues his broadsides against Republican senators:

"Does the 'GOP' stand for 'Good Ol' Pimps'? Republican Senators like Graham, Brownback, McCain, etc., have seduced the pro-life movement, made her their mistress, and then a prostitute. She gives them her 'favors' in exchange for empty promises.

"They pimp the pro-life cause, raising millions of dollars with promises to 'overturn Roe' and protect the unborn. The party platform - their false vows - calls for the overturn of Roe, and legal protection of unborn babies.

"But alas, we again see that these are seductive lies; and like any good pimp, they tell us that they love us, while they sell us out; they feign pain as we are abused and babies are murdered, while they prepare to get in bed with those who despise us, and slay the innocent.

"Our protests and rallies over the coming weeks will focus on GOP Senators who claim to be pro-life. We will call on them to stop pimping the babies, but rather to fight for them by filibustering Sotomayor."

Richard Viguerie claims that "Sotomayor's opening statement reflects she is already being defensive about the judicial philosophy she shares with President Obama."

Richard Land and the Southern Baptist Convention's Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission come out against Sotomayor:

Sonia Sotomayor’s record reveals that she is perfectly willing to lift the blindfold of justice to achieve her desired result. She is a judge with a terribly flawed view of the judicial system at best or a judge who simply doesn’t care what the law says at worst. She has constantly shown her lack of deference to the Constitution. She is the type of justice who instead of applying the law neutrally will redefine the law to conform to her policy preferences.

The bottom line is that Sonia Sotomayor is an unpredictable wildcard. Across the issues her record is either far too thin or hidden behind non-published orders and per curium opinions. Simply put, placing Sonia Sotomayor on the highest court in the land jeopardizes our nation’s commitment to equal treatment under the law.

The Family Research Council posts the Senate Policy Committee talking points in opposing Sotomayor while releasing its own list of questions it wants asked during the hearing:

Abortion and the Supreme Court

* Judge Sotomayor, while you were associated with the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, it filed six briefs in five abortion-related cases before the United States Supreme Court. In every case, those briefs asserted that the Court should adopt an uncompromising, pro-abortion position. Do you now wish to express any disagreement with the content of the briefs that were filed by the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund?

The Abortion Industry as Litigants

* Judge Sotomayor, do you believe abortion providers should be required to prove factual assertions they make in court when challenging abortion regulations?

* Judge Sotomayor, should redacted medical records be admissible, if needed by the court, to examine general medical claims about abortion?When should such records not be made available to the court?

* Judge Sotomayor, should prosecutors be permitted to subpoena and examine abortion facility records to determine whether state statutory rape laws have been violated or whether the facility is reporting potential crimes to the appropriate legal authorities?

Charmaine Yoest of Americans United for Life tells Lifenews that she is looking forward to testifying in opposition to Sotomayor:

“We are honored to have the opportunity to testify before the Judiciary Committee about the nomination of Judge Sotomayor to the highest court in the land," Yoest told LifeNews.com about her invitation.

"I am looking forward to sharing AUL’s extensive legal research about Judge Sotomayor’s record. In particular, her radical associations and judicial philosophy raises serious concerns in the pro-life community," she said.

Yoest is referring to Sotomayor's tenure with the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund, a group that has submitted numerous Supreme Court briefs arguing for an unrestricted right to abortion and claiming any pro-life limits are racist.

Although leaders with the group argue Sotomayor had no involvement in writing or approving the briefs, her longtime position as a member of its board of directors points to her support for the pro-abortion position the group took, Yoest maintains.

Yoest told LifeNews.com she plans to focus her testimony on making the connection for the senators and the American public between the positions taken by the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund during her tenure on the Board and her judicial interventionist approach to the bench.

“Her PRLDEF record proves that she is an abortion advocate," Yoest says.

"That record includes opposition to parental notification, opposition to informed consent, opposition to bans on partial-birth abortion and support for taxpayer-funded abortions. These positions are far outside the mainstream of American public opinion," she explained.

And finally, Pat Buchanan continues to be ... well, Pat Buchanan:

The chutzpah of this Beltway crowd does not cease to amaze.

They archly demand that conservatives accord a self-described “affirmative action baby” from Princeton a respect they never for a moment accorded a pro-life conservative mother of five from Idaho State, Sarah Palin.

...

Sonia is, first and foremost, a Latina. She has not hesitated to demand, even in college and law school, ethnic and gender preferences for her own. Her concept of justice is race-based.

...

Even if Sotomayor is confirmed, making the nation aware she is a militant supporter since college days of ethnic and gender preferences is an assignment worth pursuing. For America does not believe in preferences. Even in the blue states of California, Washington and Michigan, voters have tossed them out as naked discrimination against white males.

Politico has an article today reporting that Republicans are disappointed that Sonia Sotomayor's nomination to the Supreme Court hasn't turned out to be "the political lightning rod some in their party had hoped she would be."

Of course, that just means that right-wing groups will just have to try that much harder:

Curt Levey, executive director of the conservative group Committee for Justice, said senators are often slow to get into politically thorny fights — and do so only after a passionate showing by their base. Levey said he expects GOP senators to gear up for the fight, particularly during the confirmation proceedings. And he said that he is pushing the Republicans hard to delay a final Senate confirmation vote until after the monthlong August recess, to give opposition groups enough time to spotlight any controversial statements Sotomayor makes during the hearings.

“She is sort of like a Robert Bork: She’s very opinionated, and when she should be silent, she isn’t,” Levey said.

Speaking of Bork, the Wonk Room points us to this new interview with him and, shockingly, he doesn't like Sotomayor ... or pretty much anyone else for that matter:

What are your thoughts about Judge Sotomayor's nomination?

I think it was a bad mistake. Her comments about the wise Latina suggest identity-group jurisprudence. She also has a reputation for bullying counsel. And her record is not particularly distinguished. Far from it. And it is unusual to nominate somebody who states flatly that she was the beneficiary of affirmative action. But I can't believe she will be any worse than some recent white male appointees.

Anyone you'd care to name?

I could, but you don't want the estate of these people suing me, do you?

As it's currently composed, this is sometimes called a conservative court.

I don't see it at all. It's a very left-leaning, liberal court.

Could you elaborate? Compared to what?

Well, compared to what the Constitution actually says. They tend to enact the agenda or the preferences of a group that thinks of itself as the intellectual elite.

Frankly, the fact that Bork sees nothing he likes in Sotomayor is a huge positive in her favor considering that, since his own defeat to the Supreme Court in 1987, he's become a certified crank:

Robert Bork has carved out a niche for himself as an acerbic commentator on the Supreme Court, as well as various cultural issues. In fact, to Bork the two topics are closely related and the Supreme Court’s “illegitimacy” and its departure from the Constitution are in many ways responsible for our growing “cultural depravity.”

According to Bork, we are rapidly becoming a fragmented society that has totally lost its nerve and is now either unwilling or unable “to suppress public obscenity, punish crime, reform welfare, attach stigma to the bearing of illegitimate children, resist the demands of self-proclaimed victim groups for preferential treatment, or maintain standards of reason and scholarship.” Abortion, technology, affluence, hedonism, and modern liberalism are gradually ruining our culture and everywhere you look “the rot is spreading.”

Bork has denounced the public education system that “all too often teaches moral relativism and depravity.” He considers sensitivity training to be little more than “America’s version of Maoist re-education camps.” He has shared his fear that recognition of gay marriage would lead to accommodation of “man-boy associations, polygamists and so forth.” And he has criticized the feminist movement for “intimidat[ing] officials in ways that are destructive of family, hostile to masculinity, damaging to the military and disastrous for much education.”

It appears as if almost everything within contemporary culture possesses the capacity to offend Bork. He attacks movies for featuring “sex, violence and vile language.” He faults television for taking “a neutral attitude toward adultery, prostitution, and pornography” and for portraying homosexuals as “social victims.” As for the art world, most of what is produced is “meaningless, uninspired, untalented or perverse.” He frets that the “pornographic video industry is now doing billions of dollars worth of business” and the invention of the Internet will merely result in the further indulgence of “salacious and perverted tastes.” When it comes to music, “rock and rap are utterly impoverished … emotionally, aesthetically, and intellectually.”

More to the point, Bork is not content merely to criticize; he wants the government to do something about it. “Sooner or later,” he claims “censorship is going to have to be considered as popular culture continues plunging to ever more sickening lows.” So committed is he to this cause that he dedicated an entire chapter in his 1996 book Slouching Toward Gomorrah to making “The Case for Censorship.” In it, he advocates censoring “the most violent and sexually explicit material now on offer, starting with obscene prose and pictures available on the Internet, motion pictures that are mere rhapsodies to violence, and the more degenerate lyrics of rap music.”

When asked by Christianity Today about how he would decide what should and should not be censored, Bork announced: “I don’t make any fine distinctions; I’m just advocating censorship.”

Americans United for Life has sent a letter to the Senate demanding exhaustive hearings on President Obama's nominee to replace Justice David Souter:

When the Senate Judiciary Committee gathers to hold hearings on a Supreme Court nominee, one pro-life group tells the panel's chairman it wants a full discussion of where the nominee stands on abortion. The letter comes from Charmaine Yoest, the president of Americans United for Life.

"The most important question a nominee for the Supreme Court must answer is to articulate their judicial philosophy: will they advance an agenda that limits the right of the people to determine the content of abortion-related laws through the democratic process?" she writes.

"In the days ahead, we look to our Senators to uphold their duty to raise serious questions on the nominee’s judicial philosophy and reject any nominee who places personal preference over upholding the Constitution," the AUL leader adds.

Should her organization not like the answers, Yoest promises an immediate response.

"We will oppose any nominee to the Court who believes social activism trumps interpreting the Constitution," she says.

David Weigel of the Washington Independent profiles several of the right-wing judicial activist groups:

Curt Levey sometimes wears a lapel pin with the faces of Justices John Roberts and Samuel Alito and the legend “Thanks, W.” Once in a while he swaps that out for another button, with the same portraits of George W. Bush’s two high court appointments, but a more forward-looking slogan: “The kind of change we can believe in.”

“I used to work to confirm good judicial nominees,” Levey told TWI this week. “Now I’m trying to limit the damage Barack Obama can do.”

Levey is the executive director of the Committee for Justice, one of the hubs of a far-flung but close-knit group of conservatives who plan on holding President Barack Obama’s first Supreme Court pick up to a magnifying glass. During the Bush years, Levey worked at the Center for Individual Rights, a libertarian law firm that made its biggest impact with the landmark Gratz v. Bollinger and Grutter v. Bollinger affirmative action cases. Levey went on to the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice, then left to work on Supreme Court confirmations with conservatives who had prepped for these fights ever since the failed 1987 nomination of Judge Robert Bork.

Movement conservatives are in a position to oppose the nomination of almost any nominee that the president puts forward. In conversation with TWI, activists portrayed the coming confirmation hearings as a chance to peel the bark off of the president’s bipartisan image, to unite the conservative movement, and to learn lessons for future hearings with higher stakes. Few imagined that the president could get a much more liberal pick than retiring Justice David Souter through the Senate. Their focus was not so much on defeating this pick — an incredibly difficult task with only 40 Republican senators — but on carving out an election issue for the 2010 midterms and on building capital for a theoretical future battle to replace one of the court’s conservatives.

“This can be an educational moment for the American people,” said Gary Marx, the executive director of the Judicial Confirmation Network. “This is a chance to reaffirm the meaning of judicial restraint and explode the myth that Barack Obama is trans-partisan leader.”

They have some strength in numbers. While Levey cautioned that “the groups on the right are smaller than the groups on the left,” such as People for the American Way, he put together one of the first intra-movement conference calls on the coming Supreme Court fight days after the 2008 election, bringing on around 50 people. In the months since, he has collected around 30 short dossiers (averaging three pages each) on possible Obama nominees. The quiet coalition that’s ready to scrutinize Obama’s nominees includes several people who faced Democratic wrath during the Bush years, such as Tim Goeglein, a former White House aide who is now a vice president at the political arm of Focus on the Family, and Manny Miranda, a one-time aide to former Sen. Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) who spent the Roberts and Alito confirmation battles at the head of his own effort, the Third Branch Conference.

“A lot of the old Bush people went on to law firms,” Levey explained. “No one group has the resources to do 30 research memos, but by pooling out work to people and recruiting pro bono help, we’ve got more than we need at this point.”

Finally, there is lots of speculation about how Republicans and the Right would respond to a gay SCOTUS nominee, with Sen. Jeff Session saying that it wouldn't be "an automatic disqualification" while Sen. John Thune is not so sure:

“I know the administration is being pushed, but I think it would be a bridge too far right now,” said GOP Chief Deputy Whip John Thune. “It seems to me this first pick is going to be a kind of important one, and my hope is that he'll play it a little more down the middle. A lot of people would react very negatively.”

The interesting this about Thune's statement is that it sounds an awful lot like the statement Tony Perkins made earlier this week:

"I think that would be a bridge too far for him to be honest because that would enter a whole new element into the debate that I don't think he's ready for," said Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council. "A parallel to that would be Bill Clinton's gays in the military battle, which really hurt his agenda from that point forward."

Perkins said his group would not investigate anyone's sexual preferences and planned to focus on a nominee's judicial views. "The issue is the ideology," he said.