Newt Gingrich Apologizes For Calling Sotomayor A Racist

This is an apology?? If Newt's words were "perhaps" too strong and direct, then implicity "perhaps" they were not too strong and direct.
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And I don't recall either the President or Gibbs "admitting" that the judge's words are "unacceptable." To say she would have or should have chosen different words is not to call them "unacceptable."
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If this sounds picky we are, after all, arguing about the fine points of a few words. Not only did Newt not apologize, he managed to erroneously suggest the President found her words unacceptable.

Maybe we should sit athwart Newt's chest and do terrible things.

I don't see words like "regret" or "I was wrong" or "sorry" or "apologize." He is even restricting his words to those (it is to laugh) who are "open and honest."
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Instead he gets to run out these bizarre canards one more time, including having the gall to talk about equality under the law.

I'm sort of fond of the what I said on the last thread:
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But since Sotomayor said nothing that even approaches that interpretation unless deliberately excised from it's context, we can only conclude that the people who are dwelling on a single sentence uttered in 2001 are in fact motivated by their own racial animosity and their desire to assert that Latino's aren't even allowed to refer to themselves as that, let alone assert that their heritage might actually -gasp- affect them in a positive way.
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It's ironic that the same people who complain about 'political correctness' and feel that their own words are stifled by their inability to express their prejudices openly are the same ones who take the same 'code of conduct' and stretch it to the breaking point when considering how members of minority groups are allowed to talk about their own experience.
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I'm so glad we can have this conversation about Newt Gingrich. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to o watch last week's "Seinfeld" episode. (I finally figured out how to program my VCR!)

The other thing that can't be said often enough:
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http://phd9.blogspot.com/2009/05/re-sotomayor.html
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The speech that the 'offending' quote was extracted from was in it's entirety about her Hispanic heritage and it's effect on her view from the bench. That she can speak for a 1/2 hour on the topic and have only 1/2 sentence come into question suggests that she is in fact a rather sensitive and bright observer of the current state of play. This, of course is precisely what PO's the Hate-R-Us crowd.

Kathleen Parker has a dandy op-ed up about these repub spokes critters titled: Carnival of the Fire-Breathers. It's good to see some conservatives embarrassed by the current behavior of their party. here are a few tasty bits from Parker:
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It has long been a problem for the GOP that some of the party's cherished positions are embraced most enthusiastically by people whose grip on reality is sometimes . . . tenuous. This is especially true with regard to abortion.
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...
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One can convincingly argue that the media have a hand in perpetuating the conservative caricature, but the Republican Party has contributed to the distortion by pandering to its less rational elements. Still fresh in our minds is the last presidential election -- a strange season that might be attributed to GOP desperation if not for a prior history in times of political prosperity.
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Two words: Terri Schiavo. During that 2005 Operation Rescue debacle -- complete with death vigils and lamentations -- Bill Frist, then the Senate majority leader and a practicing physician, lent credibility to the circus performers by diagnosing Schiavo's condition via video and challenging other medical opinion that she was in a persistent vegetative state.
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And let's not forget how the GOP handled the 2004 U.S. Senate race in Illinois against one Barack Obama. They inserted their own African American, none other than Alan Keyes. That worked out well.
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We should never shoot the messenger, it should go without saying. But until the Republicans marginalize those who belong in the margins, they won't be attracting many new recruits. And the messengers will continue to obscure the message.

Amen to that wvng. Newt has shown a talent for hypocrisy; and his "apology" is cynically self-serving. Newt looks into the mirror and loves what he sees.

This lukewarm backtrack does not come close to addressing the angry and bigoted comments Newt initially spewed at Sotomayor and the president.

http://www.political-buzz.com/

A whole lot of the old crowd here this morning. Hi all. Hope the summer is getting off to a good start for you.

Newt misses another vital point. No human being is absolutely free from prejudice. But those who deal best with it and are most able to render 'impartial' decisions are those with sufficient self-awareness to recognize those emotions for what they are and set them aside.
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Sotomayor makes that point clearly and Newt does his best to obscure it deliberately. Say what you will about him, he knows his audience.

And yet Newt finishes with this.
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The stakes are very high with this nomination. Has President Obama nominated a conventionally liberal judge to a lifetime tenure on our highest court? Or a radical liberal activist who will cast aside the rule of law in favor of the narrow, divisive politics of race and gender identity?

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Sorry but in my mind that's just a cuter way of implying that she is racist and sexist but that she just hides it well on the appellate court. I don't see a hint of an apology anywhere in the screed. Usually when someone issues an "apology" the word "apology" or "apologize" finds its way into the text. This is a very very sympathetic reading of what is nothing more than a justification of Newt's own words with a little window dressing IMHO. But now he can claim "I apologized to her, what else do you want".

"You can read his new argument at the link."
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Uh, thanks but no.

I guess Newt couldn't ask for better PR. Here a national reporter on a blog links to his blog and just repeats what he says links to it with no analysis on what Newt's really motives are or could be.
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I'm only saying this because if one did not know better or you were not born or in a coma during the 90s you would think that Newt's opposition to Sotomayor was based soley or mainly on his principled belief system. However, that is not even remotely the case. Here you have a unelected person whom when he was Speaker of the House did absolutely nothing but go out his way to undermine the Clinton administration. He also committed fraud on the voters of America with the sham of a "Contract with America" which he made no effort what so ever of living up to. It was all bullsh*t. He also has a known history of doing the very things that he later criticizes others for doing. Newt is in this for himself.

Finally we also know that this hyprocrite while leading the charge to impeach Bill Clinton was at the same time cheating on and lying to his own wife and family and lying to the country by running constantly talking up family values that he himself did not believe in or practice. So when you link to Newt and cover his statements, people should be reminded of who he really is.

Time, among others, neglected to put Judge Sotomayor's "Latina" comment in its context as a discussion of discrimination cases.

Our corporate media has totally failed us. Nutjobs like Newt and Rush are just the pimply face of the swamp.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1901348-4,00.html

Or a radical liberal activist who will cast aside the rule of law in favor of the narrow, divisive politics of race and gender identity?
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As opposed to conservatives, who embrace the divisive politics of race and gender identity in a different way -- by celebrating and elevating the culture of white males to the end-all and be-all.
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Seriously, how is it not "identity politics" when George W. Bush -- he of Andover, Yale and Harvard -- dressed up like a cowboy and clears brush with a chainsaw for the media's loving glare? Or when he dressed up like a fighter pilot? Or strutted around in all his "commander in chief" flight jackets?
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At least the "identity politics" of Judge Sotomayor are legitimate, in that she really is Hispanic and really is a woman. George W. Bush wasn't really a macho cowboy, but because he played one on TV, it was deemed authentic. And certainly not an act of "identity politics." Oh, no.

When a football player makes a late hit that knocks someone down, he can say, "I'm sorry," or "Did that hurt?"
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Newt's "apology" was the latter.
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(Note: Not saying that this is an injury. Glad to see Sotomayor on the Hill this week.)

msmollynd said: Nutjobs like Newt and Rush are just the pimply face of the swamp. Good one. Sadly true. KT is one of the best, and yet she opens with a headline that is, as sgw so clearly noted, untrue, follows it with a modifier "well sort of" to pull back from the brink. But those who just skim headlines will come away with 'Newt is a reasonable guy' - when he isn't.
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On the other side, this could be some great ninja work . Will Newt now have to disavow the revision that he didn't actually revise to mollify the RW mouthbreathers? Will Rush call him out.
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Inquiring minds and all that.

Funny how Newt and others can run around talking about race, but never is "they are playing the race card" associated or connected to their activities.

sgwhiteinfla Says:
Wednesday, June 3, 2009 at 8:27 am
"Sorry but in my mind that's just a cuter way of implying that she is racist and sexist but that she just hides it well on the appellate court."
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Call it "cuter" or anything else you want to call it, but Sotomayor is a racist/sexist, and she has been hiding it wll on the appellate court.

Gingrich is being far more equivocal than Pelosi was about the CIA briefing, but no one in the media suggests that his circumlocutions affect his credibility. Instead, KT personifies the media's take -- Newt's "apology" for his outrageous conduct permits the media to finally acknowledge how completely inappropriate Newt's conduct has been while simultaneously forgiving Newt for his actions and forgetting they ever occurred.

The known is that Sotomayor will be confirmed. The unknown is how much damage the republicans are willing to self-inflict before this is all done.

The end times are near!
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Friedman actually wrote something worth reading today.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/03/opinion/03friedman.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

A whole lot of the old crowd here this morning. Hi all. Hope the summer is getting off to a good start for you.
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Nice to see you too, Kathy.

In KT's defense, I believe that the headlines, for articles as well as blog posts, are written by the editors, not the reporters.
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KT: is this true in this case? The lede of your post: "Well, sort of." Implies that you are continuing the thought expressed in the headline. Please clarify.