Was it a mistake for the President to backtrack for Sotomayor?

My personal sense is that he prolonged the newscycle needlessly. ANd he winds up essentially giving cover for continued attacks by creating more controversy. I know the Nominee does not speak for herself, the White House does, but she get to speak for herself during her chats with Senators and during her hearing. THis should have been something that Robert Gibbs was tasked with not the President.

My feeling is that he's trying to isolate the loonies within the GOP, make them turn on the moderates and the libertarian types who are more interested in small government than cultural wars. Tossing off a line that robs the wingnuts of any leverage furthers this agenda and will lengthen the duration of the Democratic majority he's building.

Obama's a very tactical thinker--strategic thinker, I should say. He knows he'll win this fight, he wants to be a position of winning many more to come

I am not gushing. but this guy can play chess in four dimensions, It is not simply that he sees the whole board. He is seing the dames that have not eveen started yet.

I know what you mean (having Axelrod on his staff probably doesn't hurt), but re-read your post, Perky!

Choosing different words to convey a similar meaning would not be backtracking to me.

I don't think he is "playing" with Limpo any more than I "play" when I swat away a mosquito or gnat.

I'd rather see him go on with business as usual than to see him even acknowledge this rw nonsense.

Edited to add: It would be nice, though, if MSM would do it's rightful job.

.

The longer they flap their gums, the more likely that some seriously racist/sexist shit will come out of their mouths.

It's already happening with them.

They're just going absolutely batshit that a PR female is joining the club--they can't stand the idea of her having a say "over" them, and having to deal with the fact that her opinions will help shape the law of the land. It's pretty obvious that's why they're spitting.

So far he's the wackiest of the Senators. .

n/t

talked to Sotomayor. He said he hadn't but others had.

Jake Tapper posted this on Twitter which explains who Sotomayor told that it was a poor choice of words or something to that effect.

"jaketapper: Gibbs was told this by 2 ppl sheparding Sotomayor nomination - VP Biden's CoS Ron Klain and Biden counsel Cynthia Hogan - who spoke to her"
about 4 hours ago from web

n/t

His statement was irrelevant because everyone was saying that it may have been a slightly poor choice of words but in context she made her point clear. End of story. I think the GOP would have went with this no matter what.

44 is not backtracking; he is advancing his argument in a tough but reasonable manner, as he always does when confronted with bullshit from the right.

Link to the news story: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x8441166

We'll have to wait for more clarification.

It just makes sense to most people.

EDIT: Yah, here's "backtracking":

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x8441166

"WASHINGTON, May 30 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama pushed back on Saturday at conservative critics of his Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, accusing them of twisting her words to score political points.

"There are, of course, some in Washington who are attempting to draw old battle lines and playing the usual political games, pulling a few comments out of context to paint a distorted picture of Judge Sotomayor's record," Obama said in his weekly radio address.

"But I am confident that these efforts will fail... Her achievements are all the more impressive when you consider what she had to overcome in order to achieve them," Obama said... With Obama's Democrats commanding a 59-seat majority in the 100-member Senate, Republicans are unlikely to gather the necessary votes to block her nomination."

...eom

I don't know one woman who wouldn't be outraged by that statement...

I didn't hear it.

Thanks in advance for any response :)

The link takes me to the DU search function.

when Sotomayor is on the Court she won't be menstruating when she's in key conferences with the other justices.

Could this guy's knuckles get closer to the ground?

I've heard some serious shit from that guy, but this is above and beyond.

Thanks for filling me in.

but the story is the same.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5748011&mesg_id=5748011

And thanks for that OP. Good work.

Holy shit, no wonder I left the Republican party.

to the best of my knowledge, she hasn't come out and said she would have rephrased. Obama did it.

If I were on the fence at this point, my thoughts would be that her only regret about the statement is that it came back to bite her once she was nominated for SCOTUS. With Obama trying to cover for her and her staying silent, I would dismiss Obama's attempt as pure politics and I wouldn't put much stock in his words on this. HOW is he sure she would have rephrased it (actually, he said "restated, didn't he? In that case, he is right, because she did state it again) if she doesn't come out and say she would have?

She said it, it looks like she meant it. Obama coming out in her defense when he didn't have to was a sign of weakness for no reason and with no upside. Seriously, who among those opposed to the appointment was likely to say "Oh, Obama's sure about that? Well, okay, then."

It was a stupid mistake. No potential benefit, but lots of potential perceived weakness. Dumb, dumb, dumb. Good thing we have the majorities that we do.

Polls or even focus groups might have suggested that he do this to clear the air. I really don't know, of course, I am just speculating as we all are.

My guess (just a guess) is that he wanted to get some of this behind him to move on with the nominee. He just wanted to get past it which is fine. The Repubs are doing a great job of destroying themselves. Let 'em sink in their own sea of shame...

when looking at these things I always try to take politics out of the equation immediately after my first impression to make sure i'm not off base. If my mind changes, then I assume I am.

Example: you and a loved one (spouse, parent, sibling) run into me and a friend of mine who for whatever reason decides to insult your loved one and in so doing offends the shit out of him / her. If I say "I'm sure he didn't mean it," would you assume I'm actually right, or would you immiediately come to the conclusion that I'm sticking my nose into it and just using empty platitudes in order to smooth things over? I'm thinking that you, like everyone else on the planet, would make the second assumption.

You may be right about polling data, but I see NO upside in what Obama did. His words wouldn't sway anyone, and she never came out and said the same thing. I thought the whole thing was handled poorly by Obama, who should have just stuck by his pick without trying to spoonfeed her and give us all the impression that she needs his help through all of this.

As you correctly said, though, we're all just speculating.

White House is managing it.

The burden of persuasion here is on the rightwing squawkers. If they have a sound basis of objection for this appointment, they should present it.

To date they have not.

I was watching Hardball Friday night and Shuster was acting as if the White House had covered for her putting babies in an oven or something. I just don't see how this is relevant to anything. It's like the BS media outrage after Joe Biden verbalized what everybody was already thinking when H1N1 flu hit.

leaving it to -- for example -- Media Matters to say that her comment was taken out of context, edited, from a speech on the subject her comment was directly related to.

If anyone can simply and clearly raise the level of discourse and not let the Flying Monkeys win, it is Barack Obama.

Regardless, the GOP "let's call the Hispanic woman a racist" strategy is probably one of the dumbest in recent history. If Obama didn't intend to prolong it, then I'm glad he did regardless of his intent.