Clarence Thomas

Everytime someone discusses the racist and sexist remarks of Sotomayor, someone brings up Clarence Thomas. He is used as an excuse
to allow Sotomayor into the SCOTUS.

I know next to nothing about Clarence Thomas. So I thought we should have
a thread discussing Judge Thomas. What exactly is wrong with him. Should
he ever have been allowed to as a SCOTUS judge?

If he's as bad as some say .... is there any way to be rid of him?
If he's just fine ... then this thread should help convince people of that.

Wikipedia isn't the best .. but this is what they have listed as 'influences' -

Wikipedia Bio

In 1975, when Thomas read Race and Economics by economist Thomas Sowell, he found an intellectual foundation for this philosophy.[3][12] The book criticized social reforms by government and instead argued for individual action to overcome circumstances and adversity. He was also influenced by Ayn Rand,[13] particularly The Fountainhead, and would later require his staffers to watch the 1949 film version.[3] Thomas later said that novelist Richard Wright had been the most influential writer in his life; Wright's books Native Son and Black Boy "capture[d] a lot of the feelings that I had inside that you learn how to repress."

Hey .. he likes Ayn Rand.

He made this statement about self responsibility -

He also asserted in 1984 that black leaders were "watching the destruction of our race" as they "bitch, bitch, bitch" about President Reagan instead of working with the Reagan administration to alleviate teenage pregnancy, unemployment and illiteracy.

That has racial implications but isn't racist and doesn't speak to race effecting his court room decisions.

He said this -

said that when meeting white Democratic staffers in the United States Senate, he was "struck by how easy it had become for sanctimonious whites to accuse a black man of not caring about civil rights

Okay ... that could be racist.

He said the Anita Hill situation was a

high-tech lynching of an uppity black.

Okay ... that's got racial rhetoric and could be him using that rhetoric to get himself out of a bad situation ... or he could be right. I don't know enough about that Anita Hill situation to be able to comment more.

I'm not finding information that says anything about him saying that his race, life experience, or his gender influence his court decisions. It could be out there, but I haven't found it.

Please feel free to post any and all information on why Clarence Thomas should or shouldn't be a SCOTUS judge.


Supreme Court Media
Cornell University Law School
Hands Off Clarence Thomas - left wing blog

But the worst possible tactic in the outrage wars is for Sotomayor's defenders to begrudge or belittle Clarence Thomas.

[edit on 6/2/2009 by FlyersFan]