Sotomayor, first thoughts

By now you've heard that Obama is holding a press conference at 10:15 am our time to say he's chosen federal judge Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court.

She was the chalk pick all along, so it's hard to call it surprising. Nevertheless, she came under attack early from Jeff Rosen, a well-regarded legal writer for The New Republic, in a piece that relied too heavily on unnamed sources making serious charges (about her intellectual candlepower or lack thereof) and that was savaged in the liberal blogosphere.

So what does that tell us? I think it simply tells us that the White House knows that even a much-discussed piece like Rosen's is discussed only by a few hundred or at most a few thousand people, while the rest of America says, "uh, The New what?"

But the right will use Rosen, I'd imagine, toward their ends (it'll be worth watching what he has to say -- whether he tries to stop the right using his words -- as this goes on). More generally, right-wing lines of attack against her will go along lines laid on in this memo that Ben Smith posted a while back. A taste:

-Judge Sotomayor's nomination to the Supreme Court would be very concerning given her hard-left record on the Court of Appeals, where she is recognized by practitioners as one of the more liberal judges.

-Judge Sotomayor's personal views may cloud her jurisprudence. As Judge Sotomayor explained in a 2002 speech at Berkeley, 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."

Before you attack that line, tell me persuasively that John Roberts' experience as a conservative white man doesn't color his jurisprudence. Right.

The bottom line: unless there's some bombshell, the GOP doesn't have the votes to block her, as several of them have acknowledged.

I'll have more to say on this later. Right now, I have three inches of water in my basement, and so I think I'll attend to that. I'll do a video on her later and write another piece for tomorrow.

And for those of you buying homes, on whatever continent: inspect the basement closely for signs of water damage. If you see it, stay away. I saw it but didn't. Not fun.