Sotomayor Update: Starr, Catholics & Groves
The Washington Post reports that Kenneth Starr supports the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the United States Supreme Court. In another section, The Post has a short Q & A with Barbara Perry about the history of Roman Catholics serving on the court. (Of the 110 who have served, only 11 have been Catholics and 5 of them are currently serving as justices.) By the way, according to Politico, Sotomayor has now resigned from the Belizean Grove, a group whose membership is apparently open to women only.
Ambiance 
amba12 said,
June 21, 2009 at 3:08 am
Heard that about Starr. Was puzzled as to whether it meant actively supports or just accepts.
Catholics now play a huge intellectual role in the conservative movement. (They did and do in the radical movement, too, right?) Always have, I guess, but it’s more obvious than ever before. It’s that Jesuit education. You can almost smell it, like purified brimstone. They’re like God’s legal team.
amba12 said,
June 21, 2009 at 3:11 am
I see. Starr pretty warmly supports her, by God. And Dick Cheney thinks that states and individuals should be free to choose gay marriage. It’s a big tent after all.
Randy said,
June 21, 2009 at 9:48 am
It’s a big tent after all.
Maybe. Tremendous demand for ideological purity these days, too, however: see Crist in Florida for example.
PatHMV said,
June 21, 2009 at 10:43 am
Randy, much of the supposed “ideological purity” demands are not over social issues like abortion. I can’t speak specifically to Crist (though I think much of the aggravation there is over the national party trying to pick a winner in the GOP primary), but if you look at the folks who are really on the outs, basically, with the GOP base, it’s people like Specter, who is not really very conservative in ANY area, particularly on finances and the economy. I haven’t seen a single GOP candidate whose sole areas of disagreement with the base are gay marriage or abortion be actively targeted or even heavily opposed on those grounds. But if you’re squishy in those areas AND you don’t seem to mind taxes or higher spending, then yeah, you’re in some serious trouble… because you’re opposing fundamental principles held by most Republicans across a broad spectrum of policy areas.
Randy said,
June 21, 2009 at 10:48 am
Pat, I didn’t say they were necessarily over social issues. did I?
PatHMV said,
June 21, 2009 at 3:30 pm
No, you didn’t, but my point is that the people who have been “purged” aren’t very conservative on social issues OR fiscal issues. Is it really being a “small tenter” to have some serious problems with those folks?
And it’s not like any of them were really proposing any novel, moderate solutions to any problems. They weren’t advocating reasonable restrictions (but short of a ban) on abortion, they weren’t saying “let’s borrow $50 billion instead of $100 billion,” no, they were, by and large, voting for massive debt increases and otherwise pandering to the way the headlines were running at any given moment. I don’t see how it’s overly restrictive to stop supporting some of those folks.