Judge Sotomayor and Jackie Robinson

During the hearings this week, I watched the brilliant HBO documentary on the Brooklyn Dodgers, and I was thunderstruck by the comparison between Judge Sotomayor and Jackie Robinson. Each had proven themselves worthy for their jobs and each had to undergo racist and stupid taunts from bigots without fighting back and losing their cool.

What was also striking was that these stupid bigots taunted Jackie and Judge Sotomayor because they knew that their racial privilege, which guaranteed them job protection, was ending, and just like how the old White racist ballplayers are looked upon today with derision, these Republicans will be on the wrong side of history as well.


BTW, if you ever get a chance to the HBO documentary on the Brooklyn Dodgers, please watch it. It's about so much more than baseball, a lot more.

Has to play by the Jackie Robinson rules. Obama did - they all do.

EDIT: That's why Howard Cosell deserves credit for his decent treatment of Ali, for example.

that if it weren't for Jackie and him, he wouldn't be President.

She's got the double whammy.

Jackie had it a WHOLE lot tougher. Had to take crap in the Army. Couldn't even buy a house in major parts of NY.