Here’s My Point: It’s a Matter of Fairness for Everyone

What’s the saying? “Time flies,” or is it more like “Ain’t it funny how time slips away?” Whatever it is, “Time waits for no man,” or woman for that matter, and once it is gone it is gone. I began thinking about the passing of time this week when I realized, much to my surprise, that it has been one year since I was handed the reigns of the Ashe Mountain Times. The fact that the year passed by so quickly made me realize how quickly and sometimes quietly things in this life change.

Now I have enjoyed this last year, which has come with more than a few surprises, and I look forward to many more years of not only putting forth my opinions for you to debate but also, and much more important to me, bringing you news without opinions so that you can make up your own mind.

Sometimes it is difficult to have to choose what press release or news tip to develop into a story, and when space is tight in the paper, to decide which things to cover and which to let go. Because we just can’t cover everything, no matter how much we would like to.

In making those choices, I would hope that a wise white male with the richness of his experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a Latina woman who hasn’t lived that life.

What, I can’t say that? But I thought that things had changed and we could all just say what we think without having to worry.

I guess that it’s only alright if you’re not that white male. After all we old white guys are the problem, aren’t we? Well, aside from founding the country and writing the founding documents, establishing and voting in affirmative action, freedom to vote for women and racial minorities, ending slavery of our fellow human beings and many, many things I don’t have room to mention.

But we are not permitted to take pride in those achievements because some of those same old white guys made the wrong choices hundreds of years ago and chose to own humans and treat them as animals. That was wrong, and we stopped after thousands of white guys died to bring it to an end, but we can’t be proud of that either.

You know the President made a lot of speeches and statements running up to his election that the time for racial division was past and that to survive as a nation we had to put all those old ghosts to rest and just be Americans, but nothing has changed, and the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor is yet another example. The woman makes an overtly race tinged statement repeatedly, but nobody who is white is permitted to talk out against it or be tagged racist themselves. Another, and not as widely publicized statement from the same speech, as the wise Latina woman remark is “Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences,” she said, for jurists who are women and nonwhite, “our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging.”

Now I thought that our judges, no matter what the level, were supposed to leave their race and gender in the cloakroom and base their decisions on the letter of the law. If another has wronged someone, they deserve judgment based of facts, not whether or not those sitting in judgment are viewing the details of the case through the prism of race or gender.

I am concerned about how Judge Sotomayor will look at cases that come before her that might remind her about one of the rich experiences from her life. I am also concerned over the fact that she thinks a Latina woman makes better decisions than a white male. Would that equate to a Latina woman will make a better argument than a white male? Will she put more stock into those arguments and will it sway her judgment to be more sympathetic to the non-white male? If so, is she truly fit to serve on the highest court in the land, and in case you forgot, one of the three equal branches of our government.

But it is all moot anyway because she will be confirmed, don’t doubt it. The Republicans are too afraid of losing the Hispanic vote completely to oppose her appointment and the President is too busy running car companies to care. Besides, it is all political anyway. Just like her last appointment when President George H. W. Bush made a deal to put her on the U.S. District Court in New York. Sotomayor was nominated as part of a compromise in which Democratic Senator Patrick Moynihan was allowed to recommend judges for two of the seven vacancies. Because she has that tie to Republicans it will be near impossible to keep her off the High Court. That and the majority of Democrats in the House and Senate guarantees, save some damming evidence of accepting bribes or the like, that she will become Justice Sotomayor. I just hope she learns a new way to look at the world maybe even ask a few white males around D.C. how life looks to them, she might be surprised, since no group has had to change more than we old white guys, maybe there is something in the richness of our experiences that she can learn from, too.