The Buchanans, Pat and Bay, are at it again, stirring up controversy, and making many observers “roll their eyes”! 🙂
Pat Buchanan, the Nixon speechwriter and Reagan loyalist, who challenged the first President Bush for the nomination of the GOP for President in 1992, and then ran as a Reform Party candidate for President twice, even having an effect on the Florida election results in 2000, has commented on the fact that some think Elena Kagan is a lesbian, and also that she is Jewish, which makes for three Jews on the Supreme Court, all appointed by Democratic Presidents! The fact that almost all previous Supreme Court Justices, except for about twenty, have been Protestants, apparently is not an issue to the Buchanans! 🙁
Buchanan is not the only person in the Republican party to bring up the rumored homosexuality of Elena Kagan, and the Obama Administration has been actively criticizing the tactic!
But bringing up the fact Kagan is Jewish only smells of the old beliefs that Buchanan is anti Semitic, which has been part of the image that he has, because of his inappropriate comments!
But it is interesting that if one goes back to look at Democratic Presidents since John F. Kennedy, we find two appointments (Byron White who was Protestant and Arthur Goldberg who was Jewish) by JFK; two appointments by Lyndon B. Johnson (Abe Fortas who was Jewish and Thurgood Marshall who was African American); no appointments by Jimmy Carter, as no member of the Court left the bench during his term; two appointments by Bill Clinton (Ruth Bader Ginsberg who is Jewish and Stephen Breyer who is Jewish); and now two by Barack Obama (Sonia Sotomayor who is Latino and Elena Kagan who is Jewish)!
So when one examines Democratic appointments in the past half century, a total of eight, five were indeed Jewish, one African American, one Latino, and only the first one was a Protestant! This is certainly interesting information, but it should not be a plus or minus to judge Supreme Court nominees because of their religion or ethnicity!
But Bay Buchanan, Pat’s sister and a long term conservative activist, makes an even more ridiculous assertion about Elena Kagan! She declares that Kagan is totally unqualified simply because she has no direct judicial experience, despite the fact that many Supreme Court Justices never had judicial experience, but turned out to be superb members of the Court!
It is not that only Bay Buchanan has made Kagan seem to lack the experience and knowledge to be a Supreme Court Justice, but that she has, earlier in 2008 and ever since, claimed that former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, the GOP VIce Presidential nominee, was superbly qualified and talented to be President ofr the United States!
That comment makes any neutral observer come to the conclusion that Bay Buchanan must be drinking, or smoking something illegal, or is totally certifiable for a mental hospital! 🙂 LOL
Both Buchanans lose all legitimacy by their statements about Elena Kagan, who worked with two great judges–Abner Mikva of the Court of Appeals (1979-1994), and Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall (1967-1991), who she clerked for! She is indeed a credit to both judicial giants and will be a star figure on the Supreme Court, once she overcomes the bias, prejudice, and pettiness being promoted by Republican opponents! 🙁