Senator Amy Klobuchar from Minnesota is the first out of the gate after the lunch break. More references to humble beginnings and overcoming obstacles to achieve the American Dream. Klobuchar makes a good point, that all judges’ life experiences effect their decision making process.

Next up is Senator Kaufman from Delaware. He says appointing nominees to SCOTUS is Congress’s most important job besides declaring war. OK – not really happy with the militarism of that statement. But at least he’s moved beyond gendered language and said “she” when referring to a nominee. Takes a jab at people who focus on “activist judges” and “litmus tests.” Then says that he sees “no biases” in Sotomayor’s catalog of rulings. Oh, snap. Now there’s another reference to humble beginnings. This seems to be the theme of the day. Even though he says he thinks men and women have the same life experiences, he believes that diversity on the court is a good thing because it will reflect a broader spectrum of life experiences. How does that work? Very confused. Then another baseball reference. What’s the big deal about balls?

Arlen Specter is the third Democrat in a row to speak. The former Republican is talking about how diversity on the court is important. Now he’s saying that he is more concerned about which cases that SCOTUS didn’t decide to hear, rather than which cases they actually heard because he says that it leaves a lot of confusion about what the actual precedent on issues is. He’s really focused on terrorist surveillance and the FISA courts and SCOTUS’s refusal to hear these cases. He says he wants to know what her standard will be for deciding which cases will be heard by SCOTUS. [Read more...]