Rubio: "It's Curious" How Crist Came To Oppose Sotomayor
Former Florida state House Speaker Marco Rubio is having a rough time in his campaign for Senate, in which he's running as an insurgent conservative challenger against moderate Gov. Charlie Crist -- but he's claiming credit for pushing Crist to the right.
Crist recently came out against the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court -- putting himself to the right of retiring GOP Sen. Mel Martinez, the man that Crist and Rubio are aiming to succeed, who supports Sotomayor. Rubio sees this as a sign of Crist reaching out to conservatives.
"A few months ago he appointed a judge to the Florida Supreme Court that is much more liberal than (Sotomayor) is in terms of his views," Rubio said told Bay News 9. "We agree on it, but it's curious how he got there."
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On the ground coverage of Rubio v. Crist:
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July 27, 2009 1:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
At the very least, hopefully Obama will be constrained from nominating another Catholic to the Supreme Court should he have another chance.
Sotomayor's confirmation will install a Catholic supermajority. 66% of the Supreme Court (6 of the 9 Justices) will be Catholic, in a country where less than a quarter of the population is so.
If ethnic diversity is an asset to the Court, why is religious diversity less so? Someone's ethnic background may affect how that person views the world, but that person's religion absolutely does.
I was surprised that Sotomayor's religion was not an issue during her hearings. If Obama goes with another next time and that person get confirmed, 7 of 9 Justices will be Catholic.
Given the Catholic Church's views on abortion, birth control, stem cell research, genetic modification, gay marriage, etc., why aren't more people concerned about Catholic over-representation on the US Supreme Court?
July 27, 2009 3:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Because most American Roman Catholics pick and choose which of the rules that are handed down by the Vatican that they want to follow. American Catholics are concentrated on the coasts, often near the larger US cities - ie, Dem/liberal territory. They are traditionally Dems. And on things like birth control, stem cell research, even abortion, they often don't agree with the Vatican - at least not in practice. They may personally say they are pro-life - and many are - but few are anti-choice. The hardcores on that issue belong to the evangelical Protestants (and many of those folks think Catholics are the devil's minions) The Vatican is also anti-death penalty and generally anti-war but I don't think you'd find too many RCs in NYC or Boston or Philly calling for an end to the death penalty. And prior to both Iraq adventures in the last 20 years there was a lot of bi-partisan war cheering in the Roman Catholic strongholds in this country. In other words, what the Vatican says to do/believe and what American RCs actually do/believe is not the same thing. And that's why there's not a lot of concern re: the number of Catholics on the Court. Take Sotomayor, for instance. I'm sure her personal views are nowhere near those of Nino Scalia or Alito...yet all three are Roman Catholics...ethnic RCs, in fact.
July 27, 2009 5:13 PM | Reply | Permalink