Conservatidiots of the Day: Jeff Sessions and Lindsey Graham

The Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor have begun, which means the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee have amped up the crazy factor to eleven in order to paint the long-serving judge as a reverse racist, a hothead, and an anti-American villain straight out of a 1960s propaganda film. While there are plenty of Republicans on the Judiciary Committee to dissect and analyze, two stuck out like 'lil Southern dandies strapped to a telephone pole in the Bronx, repeating some of the same baseless attacks promoted by the conservative blogosphere while also coming up with some creative attack lines of their own.

First, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) grilled Sotomayor on her Puerto Rican heritage. Not only did he become the one millionth conservative to bastardize her "wise Latina" remarks, but he also voiced his belief that all Puerto Rican judges should vote the same way:

You voted not to reconsider the prior case. You voted to stay with the decision of the circuit, and in fact, your vote was the key vote. Had you voted with Judge Cabranes, himself of Puerto Rican ancestry, had you voted with him, you could have changed that case. So in truth you weren't bound by that case.

Brilliant! Sessions apparently believes that Sotomayor should refrain from independent thought on the bench, and vote with her colleagues because they are of the same skin color and ancestry. This should come of no surprise, considering Sen. Sessions was a former supporter of the Ku Klux Klan down in good old Alabama, so naturally, all Puerto Ricans are single-minded and dependent on one another when it comes to decision making. By the way, for those of you wondering who this Judge Cabranes is, he is a federal judge nominated to the bench by conservative darling Ronald Reagan in 1986. Surely, you'd think Cabranes would be on the same page as Jeff Sessions, considering Sessions used him as political fodder in his attacks against Sotomayor. Well, think again, as this is what Cabranes had to say when he was made aware of Sessions's comments:

I don’t believe for a minute that there are any differences in our [Cabranes and Sotomayor's] approach to judging, and her personal predilections have no affect on her approach to judging.

BURN! Feel that, Jeff Sessions? That's the kick in the teeth you routinely get whenever you claim minorities should vote the same way simply because of their race. Something else you should know about Sessions and Cabranes: Sessions was nominated alongside Cabranes in 1986 to become a federal judge. Unlike Cabranes, Sessions was not confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate. Why not, you ask? Because of Jeff Sessions's previous affiliation with the Ku Klux Klan and his demonstrated insensitivity towards racial groups. And yet, this man is the ranking member on the Senate Judiciary Committee, where he is allowed to snarl and huff at an Hispanic nominee for being "racist" because she said that a Latina woman like herself has different experiences than stuffy old white men like Jeff Sessions. Ironic, no?

Our second conservatidiot is Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who really went a mile out of his way to attempt to paint Sotomayor not only as a racist, but as a terrorist sympathizer. Graham, who supports the "war on terra," re-read the "wise Latina" remark and then claimed that her comments could be damaging to advancing democracy in the Middle East. Why? Because apparently, insurgents in the Middle East give a shit what some judicial nominee in the United States has to say about race and gender. Apparently, such statements will set women back in Afghanistan and Iraq, since a justice who pays attention to race in the United States has some sort of domino effect on what happens over there. Of course, by that logic, then we never should have allowed Sandra Day-O'Connor or Ruth Bader-Ginsburg to sit on the bench, since the "terra-ists" fucking hate women and those two could have inspired women to seek political positions in those countries, which would surely rile the extremists over there.

Sort of like what's happening in America, come to think of it: An Hispanic woman who is proud of her ethnic background will most likely be the next Supreme Court justice in the United States, and right-wing extremists around the country are freaking out. They're calling her a "racist," implying that she is an activist when her decisions don't say as much, and insinuating that remarks she made which were misconstrued by pandering white Republicans are secretly supporting the mission of "terra-ists" abroad. Thank you, Sen. Graham, for proving, albeit unintentionally, that the "terra-ists" you hope to defeat are no better than the majority of those within today's Republican Party.