RUSH: I guess about 45 minutes ago I’m sitting here minding my own business, bothering nobody in the process of doing show prep and I get an e-mail from a Drive-By Media guy that I like, Chris Cillizza, who writes the blog The Fix at the Washington Post. And he says, ‘I’m doing a story here on Souter and the Supreme Court nomination that Obama’s got coming up here, and I want know if you think that the Republicans will be making a mistake by really opposing this or should they not do anything?’ I’m paraphrasing the question. I wrote him back and I said, ‘I look at all of this from a different template than you guys do.’ I said, ‘The fun for me is going to be watching all the nutcases on the left go wacko trying to convince Obama to pick one of their own. The Republicans, you know, any time they seriously contrast themselves with Obama, I think it’s a win-win for them.’ But I said, ‘You’re focused on what the Republicans are going to do. When did it change that you don’t focus on the people who have power? I mean, you continue to look at the Republicans here, but the Democrats are the ones that have power, and the real fun for me is going to be watching all these wacko fringe nutcases from the blogs and everything else start pressuring Obama to pick somebody like Ward Churchill.’ (laughing)
Now, we’ve got some great audio sound bites of what Obama thinks of the court anyway. That’s coming up on the program today. I also told Chris, I said, ‘I’m also going to keep a sharp eye to see if his nominee has a tax problem because that seems to be standard operating procedure for Obama cabinet picks, and now we’ll see if it holds for Supreme Court nomination.’ The search will be on for a Supreme Court nominee who has a tax problem. Supreme Court justice David Souter leaving the Supreme Court in June so all the liberal eyes now turn to Obama for a replacement. A name, his first appointment destined to be reported. By the way, whoever he picks, just like Gibbs is the greatest PR guy, the greatest spokesman ever, whoever he picks, we’re going to hear it’s the smartest, the best, nobody could have ever found a person this good and this qualified to be on the Supreme Court. We all know the nominee is going to be a liberal. I mean, that’s a given. Will it be an African-American liberal? Will it be a female liberal? Will it be an African-American female liberal? Or will it be an African-American female liberal from Chicago? Or will it be a Latina, a Hispanic woman?
Now, the early betting right now is on Sonia Sotomayor, who is Hispanic, and it’s a little early to go on that stuff. As I say, whatever names surface there are going to be some leftists unhappy about it. Now, you have to understand, too, that when liberals start choosing nominees to the Supreme Court, they don’t necessarily go find people who have any knowledge of the law. Obama looks at the Supreme Court — you’ll hear this coming up in the sound bites — Obama looks at the court and he wants people who have the proper feelings. He wants people who empathize with the downtrodden. If they know the law, so much the better. But do you know a Supreme Court justice does not have to be a lawyer? A Supreme Court justice does not have to have ever argued a case in court.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
Let’s go to the audio sound bites, and let’s listen to what the Drive-Bys are saying as regards the Supreme Court opening created by the announced retirement of David Souter. We have a montage here today: Robin Roberts of ABC, George ‘Stephy’ Stephanopoulos of ABC, Chuck Todd from NBC, and Chris Wallace of the Fox News Channel talking about who Obama might pick.
ROBERTS: It’s widely expected that this selection will be a woman.
STEPHANOPOULOS: President Obama has said that he wants to add another woman to the court. I would say the leading candidate is Judge Sonia Sotomayor. She would be not only a woman but the first Hispanic.
TODD: …the pressure to appoint a woman. But the Hispanic community really would like to see the first ever Hispanic Supreme Court justice.
WALLACE: A lot of pressure to appoint a woman, lot of pressure to appoint a Hispanic, the first Hispanic. How about a twofer: Sonia Sotomayor, uhhh, you know, an appeals court judge and Hispanic woman. You heard it here first.
RUSH: Well, the pressure already being brought to bear, according to the Drive-Bys, for an Hispanic woman. The pressure, it must be unbearable for Obama. The pressure being brought to… By the way, somebody sent me a note during the break saying I mispronounced Sonia Sotomayor’s name, that her name is actually pronounced Sonia So-to-my-or, not as in ‘mayor.’ It’s spelled S-o-t-o-m-a-y-o-r. These guys all pronounce it Soto-mayor, as I did, but I’m told it’s pronounced So-to-my-or. Regardless, we’re covering our bases. Who is she? She is a judge now on the court of appeals. I’m not sure which circuit she’s on, but she’s one of these judges that allows her personal views to be a factor in the way she decides cases. She gave a speech at Berkeley in 2002.
She said ‘she believes it is appropriate for a judge to consider their ‘experiences as women and people of color’ in their decision making, which she believes should ‘affect our decisions as judges,” and that’s right up Obama’s alley. That’s, as you will hear in the program today, exactly the kind of judge Obama wants. In recent case, Ricci v. DeStefano, Judge Sotomayor was chastised by fellow Clinton-appointee Jose Cabranes for going to extraordinary lengths to dispense with claims of unfair treatment raised by firefighters. Judge Sotomayor’s panel [of judges] heard a case raising important questions under Title VII and equal protection law, but attempted to dispose of the firefighter’s arguments in a summary order, until called out by Judge Cabranes. The Supreme Court has agreed to review the case.’
Anyway, that’s the big name. There are other names on the list, too. You’re looking women: Elena Kagan, Diane Wood. We’ll see, but it’s not going to change the balance of anything, folks. I mean, Souter for the most part votes with the libs. Whoever Obama picks is going to be a lib (probably with a tax problem) and so the balance won’t be upset. It’s just that we gotta get a younger lib. But we all knew this. I mean, this is the exact kind of thing that was going to happen on Supreme Court nominations, what with Obama winning the presidency.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Let’s go to sound bite number four. Show you that the — as the way the libs look at judges, Supreme Court or otherwise, it’s all about identity politics. On the Today Show today, Matt Lauer talking to Chuck Todd. ‘Why don’t we take these two things and combine them; the pressure to appoint a woman, the pressure to appoint an Hispanic. We look at somebody like Sonia Sotomayor, who is a Hispanic woman, a federal appeals judge. What are her chances’ old Chuck?
TODD: Well, I think a lot of people look at them and they — they seem to be pretty good. She’s, uh, both… Uh, checks a lot of boxes on the academic front. She’s, uh, been on the federal bench quite a bit, so she certainly has the qualifications. Uh, the background is very important. We heard President Obama as Candidate Obama talk about somebody who didn’t necessarily grow up of privilege or grow up in the academic world, and so she does check all the correct boxes.
RUSH: So you see, it is exactly as I said at the top of the program: Judicial qualifications are not the primary concern. Empathy, feelings, identity politics. You gotta go get a woman, gotta go get a Hispanic woman. Now, this is the media speculation here. The media is attempting obviously to shape this, and we don’t know to what extent the Obama White House has leaked, if anybody, Sonia Sotomayor’s name. But you can see that clearly there’s a steamroller effect here gathering for her nomination. And nobody’s talking about her legal qualifications. That side’s not. They’re talking about the things that you notice about her when you look at her. She’s a woman and she’s an Hispanic, and somehow that’s all you need to be qualified.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Okay. So according now to the Obama administration, folks, we are now profiling candidates for the Supreme Court. They have to ‘check all the right boxes.’ That’s what Chucker Todd said at NBC. That Sonia Sotomayor, why, she checks all the right boxes! We’re seeking out certain races and sexes. Profiling is bad for law enforcement, but good for judicial selection. Maybe Chucker Todd can tell us when it’s appropriate to use race and gender and when it’s not. I guess it’s perfectly fine for liberal Democrats to use race and gender, ‘make sure they check all the right boxes,’ in other words: profile. So profiling. This is what I meant. This is what I meant when I said, ‘The fun for me is going to be watching all these liberal groups go nuts advocating for the people they want Obama to pick.’
And they’re gonna go nuts on the basis of identity politics and profiling and all that. Remember when George W. Bush appointed Alberto Gonzales for attorney general, the first Hispanic ever. Alberto Gonzales was attacked. Bush got no credit for the appointment with the media. When Bush’s father appointed the second black to the court, it was the same thing. It wasn’t a real Hispanic, and Clarence Thomas wasn’t an authentic black guy. So both Clarence Thomas and Alberto Gonzales were under attack from day one. But now, the Obama administration is profiling for Supreme Court nominations. Let’s see what kind of scrutiny Obama’s nominee gets. I can tell you, there won’t be any scrutiny. What we’re going to get is, ‘Why, this is the smartest woman,’ or smartest Hispanic, or smartest whatever they pick.
‘Ever! This is the most qualified judge ever! Oliver Wendell Holmes is on third base compared to this person.’ It’s just going to be the same hype that we got about Robert Gibbs, about how there’s never, ever been a better press spokesman, press secretary than that idiot. It’s going to be the same thing. There won’t be any scrutiny. To give you an illustration, this happened today on Scarborough’s show on PMSNBC. He was talking to Tavis Smiley. He’s on PBS. He ‘checks all the boxes,’ too. Tavis Smiley is male, he’s black, he’s minority, and he works at PBS. So Tavis Smiley is a perfect guess for NBC. He checks all the boxes.
And Scarborough said to Tavis Smiley, Tavis, ‘Let’s talk about identity politics. Thurgood Marshall replaced on the court by Clarence Thomas. Do you think that African-Americans deserve to have a justice on the court that represents the majority of their….?’ Joe! Joe, please, say you didn’t ask that, Joe. Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe. I don’t care who the guest is. What are you doing? I love Joe Scarborough. Asking Tavis Smiley, ‘Do you think that African-Americans deserve to have a justice on the court that represents the majority of their…?’ Joe, you’ve got a book coming out on conservatism, and you ask that? Anyway, here’s what Tavis Smiley, which, again, perfect guest for MSNBC, he ‘checks all the boxes.’ He’s black, he’s minority, and works at PBS. Here’s his answer.
SMILEY: I think that every president ought to consider how the court ought to be balanced. As an African-American I will sit and tell you that I do not agree with… There’s almost nothing that Clarence Thomas has ruled on. I could think of one case where he ruled on in a cross-burning case which shocked the heck… I mean I almost went into full cardiac arrest when he came down on the right side of this cross-burning case.
SCARBOROUGH: (cackling)
SMILEY: But it was in fact a cross-burning case, and my thing is if you can’t get that right, Justice Thomas. Having said that there is an African-American on the court and if identity politics go into play here this is not a Hispanic on the court. And I don’t think you ought to, you know, pick and choose based upon ethnicity. But I think it is true, though, that we live now, Joe, in the most multicultural —
SCARBOROUGH: Right!
SMILEY: — multiracial, multiethnic America ever, and that everybody in this great country deserves to see himself or herself represented —
SCARBOROUGH: Right!
SMILEY: — in the court system.
RUSH: (laughing) That is just stupid. That is a perfect illustration of what the hell is wrong with the whole culture and the whole country. Tavis, your Clarence Thomas’ remarks are just embarrassingly naive and ignorant. Asians don’t have anybody in the court. I don’t hear them complaining. Even beyond that, though, he says here, ‘I don’t think we ought to do identity politics,’ and then goes on to lay out how we need to have virtually every… Folks, we’ve got so many mutts in this country now. There’s been so much… I don’t know how you do this. We’re not just Asians anymore or white Americans. Everybody is something. We’ve all got so much… Whatever happened to the concept: We’re all just Americans?
What about finding people with the best qualifications? This is, after all, the Supreme Court! Anybody ever found a logical reason to go out and find the best judge, the best candidate, the best American you can find? Now we’re being told that it is not only okay, it is required that we profile, and in this opening, ‘We gotta get the female Hispanic on there. We gotta get the female.’ To listen to this stuff is just… I sit here and laugh about it, but it’s a great illustration of what the left has done to our entire culture. Merit doesn’t matter. Pandering to minorities is everything. Here’s Obama. Now, this is July 18th, 2007. This is in Washington during the annual Planned Parenthood conference. Obama said this about the Supreme Court.
OBAMA JULY 2007: We need somebody who’s got the empathy to recognize what it’s like to be uh, a — a — a young teenaged mom. Uh, the empathy to understand what it’s like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled.
RUSH: Well, this is two years ago, a year-and-a-half ago now. That’s President Obama, before Planned Parenthood. We need somebody with empathy, that knows what it’s like… This has nothing to do with legal cases. (interruption) Well, I’m sure we could find one, Snerdley. No, here’s what we need. We need a teenaged single mother who is gay, who’s a lesbian; who’s dirt poor; African-American; and disabled. Or, if we can’t find that person, we need a bigger Supreme Court. So… (sigh) I’m sure we can find in any blue city a poor minority teenaged mother who can barely get around. Disabled, lesbian, had the kid with surrogacy or artificial insemination. I’m sure you can find it. You know they’re all over the place. You can find one. Whether they’re qualified to be on the court doesn’t matter. Because their qualifications, Obama just said what they are. Now, here he is again in Las Vegas. This is November 2007. And it’s presidential — Democrat presidential debate. Barack Obama and the moderator Wolf Blitzer have this exchange about the Supreme Court.
OBAMA NOVEMBER: Sometimes we’re only looking at academics or people who have been in the courts. If we can find people who have life experience and they understand what it means to be on the outside, what it means to have the system not work for them, that’s the kind of person I want —
BLITZER: Thank you.
OBAMA: — on the Supreme Court.
BLITZER: Thank you.
RUSH: Fine. That means we can be get criminals, too. Obviously if you’re a criminal, the system hasn’t worked for you. (laughs) So we need to get lawbreakers. We need to add lawbreakers to the other lists of identities. Who’s going to vet these people? You know, I’ll tell you where we’re going to get the next nominee, if it’s not Sonia. I mean, Sonia Sotomayor may be good, but she doesn’t fit all this stuff. She is sadly lacking in the qualifications Obama himself has laid out. It seems to me that to find the next Supreme Court justice or nominee, we’re going to have to go to the Jerry Springer Show, and he’s the guy that’s going to vet them.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: What sound bite did I leave off with? We’re up to number eight? So I left off with number seven. Play number seven again. Here’s Barack Obama November 15th, 2007, Democrat debate, presidential debate, Wolf Blitzer and Obama have this exchange.
OBAMA NOVEMBER: Sometimes we’re only looking at academics or people who have been in the courts. If we can find people who have life experience and they understand what it means to be on the outside, what it means to have the system not work for them, that’s the kind of person I want —
BLITZER: Thank you.
OBAMA: — on the Supreme Court.
BLITZER: Thank you.
RUSH: And he also said he wants them to be poor. Clarence Thomas grew up poor, Mr. President, just to throw that in. By the way, Sonia Sotomayor is Puerto Rican. This is going to make the Mexicans and the Cubans angry. There will not be unity here on the Hispanic side. Sonia Sotomayor is Puerto Rican, and that’s ignoring the Mexicans, and that’s ignoring the Cubans. And, by the way, folks, since Obama says ‘what it means to be on the outside, what it means to have system not work for you,’ we gotta get an illegal alien on the Supreme Court. We need an illegal immigrant on the Supreme Court. They fit the definition of what it means to be on the outside, what it means to have the system not work for them. The court is looking at foreign law more and more. Shouldn’t we have a representative from the United Nations on the Supreme Court? I find it curious, folks, I find it very, very curious that nobody has mentioned a Muslim or an Islamist. I mean, they live here, too. And they suffer, as we all know, vast discrimination. So what Obama’s really looking for here, folks, what he really means with all these comments, he’s looking for a radical who is a minority, who will use the court to advance Obama’s political agenda. This is what it all boils down to.
If he’s looking for a criminal, talk about a guy who checks all the boxes, Alcee Hastings. Black, former judge, impeached as a judge, now a member of Congress, he’s a confirmed criminal. And criminals, you know, the system’s not worked for them. We need a criminal. We need an illegal immigrant. We need a Muslim, Islamist; we need a single mother who is gay, very poor. I mean, these are the qualifications Obama is throwing out there. It’s looking worse and worse for poor old Sonia Sotomayor as the day goes on here. She simply doesn’t check enough boxes. Chuck Todd says she checks all the boxes, but as we listened to Obama describe his own qualifications, Sonia Sotomayor is a piker. Here. Let’s go to May 11th, last year, CNN’s Late Edition, Wolf Blitzer interviewing Obama, and Blitzer says, ‘Are there members or justices right now upon whom you would model, you would look at? Who do you do like?’
OBAMA: What I do want is a judge who is sympathetic enough to those who are on the outside, those who are vulnerable, those who are powerless, those who can’t have access to political power, and as a consequence, can’t protect themselves from being dealt with sometimes unfairly.
RUSH: He wants a judge sympathetic enough to those who are on the outside. Get Saul Alinsky. Just go resurrect Saul Alinsky. Exhume the body and nominate him because that’s what this is, Rules for Radicals, put one of these clowns on the Supreme Court, and the more boxes you can check off on the identity politics side, the better. Now, I have a See, I Told You So here from my own program October 28th last year. This is what I said on this program about then-Senator Obama’s philosophy of the Supreme Court.
RUSH ARCHIVE: You know legal justice is an entirely different thing than political and economic justice. And Obama wants the court to be concerned with economic justice. He wants legal cases that end up before federal courts, including the Supreme Court, he wants judges on those courts to look at economic and political aspects of the case, not the legal definition of justice, because the legal definition of justice is not what he’s interested in — economic justice, punishing achievers, labeling them guilty when they haven’t done anything.
RUSH: Returning the nation’s wealth to its, quote, unquote, rightful owners, and wherever he can advance that agenda, Supreme Court’s a great place, these people end up for life there. So let’s go back to 2001, Chicago FM radio station, the host interviewing state Senator Obama. And her question, ‘We’re joined here by Barack Obama, Illinois state senator from the 13th District, senior lecturer in the law school, University of Chicago.’ And this is what Obama said about the redistribution of wealth.
OBAMA: If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court, I think where it succeeded was to invest formal rights in previously dispossessed peoples so that I would now have the right to vote, I would now be able to sit at the lunch counter and — and order and, as long as I could pay for it, I’d be okay, but the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and sort of more basic issues of political and economic justice in the society.
RUSH: There you have it. That’s Barack Obama eight years ago in Chicago on an FM radio station, redistribution of wealth, economic justice. That’s the court. That’s what it’s to be used for. In this next bite he’s very upset, the Warren Court was not radical enough.
OBAMA: As radical as I think people tried to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution, at least as it’s been interpreted, and Warren Court interpreted it in the same way that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties, says what the states can’t do to you, says what the federal government can’t do to you, but it doesn’t say what the federal government or the state government must do on your behalf, and that hasn’t shifted, and one of the tragedies of the civil rights movement was because the civil rights movement became so court focused, I think that there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributive change. And in some ways we still suffer from that.
RUSH: So there you have it, his own words, and he’s not changed. Redistribution of wealth, returning the wealth of the nation to its rightful owners, that’s the purpose of judges, that’s the purpose of courts. And here again, he talks about Al-Qaeda is not constrained by Constitution. Here he explains what that means. He feels constrained by a Constitution, series of negative rights. It says what the government can’t do, what the government can’t do, but the Constitution doesn’t say what the government can do, and he wants to change that and he wants to have judges on the Supreme Court that are going to facilitate and implement his radical social agenda. It has nothing to do, per se, with justice, legal justice, or the law.