The disappearance of the Republicans would enable the Democratic Party establishment to move even further to the Right.

I have an issue with the wording of this article ... the last bit about the next nomination being “someone less liberal”.  If even Truthdig can refer to Sotomayor as “liberal” then I guess the whole political spectrum just moved well to the right!

Yes, point taken, the only thing the Republicans gain from this is to make it look like they have given something up and deserve a MORE conservative judge next time.  But to balance the appointments of Alito and Roberts there would have to be a couple of hard left anti-corporate judges added to the mix.  I don’t even know if there are any judges like that left in the U.S. to choose from after 3 decades of conservative appointments.

Anarcissie: To your comment:” marching bravely towards the sunset”. I could only think of the movie “Hurry Sundown”, it can’t come soon enough for me. As for them(GOP)marching bravely, they actually seen more cowardly to me as they hide behind lies, ignorance, stupidity, arrogance, the religious whacked out fringe, the tea-baggers, the birthers, and the list is endless.

Oh, this is really smart politics for the GOP. Let’s see if they can shrink themselves even further, as even their supposed “moderates” like McCain diligently work to alienate the last remaining hispanic voters who haven’t already sworn never to vote Republican so long as they live. And let’s peel away some more of the women voters while we’re at it.

Right-wing Cubans?  Well, you could ask.  In to my light observation right-wing Cubans are not quite in the same bag as most American right-wingers.  Needless to say, they don’t have quite the same feelings about immigration and language (remember the English-only movement?) and sometimes share the Roman Catholic belief that the community or the state ought to do something about the poor.  They might well think Sotomayor’s middle-of-the-road politics were reasonably tolerable.  But I’m just going by articles I’ve read in the Miami Herald and some of the Spanish newspapers—all the actual Cubans I have met have been more or less left-wing.

I wonder how right-wing Cuban-Americans regard Sotomayor.

P. T.:
‘The dynamic is kind of interesting since most Hispanics self-identify by nationality. ...’

Depends on the context.

The Republicans chose to make an issue out of Sotomayor’s “race” and supposed racism.  Especially given the recent rightist agitation around immigration, I would guess the average Mexican, Dominican, Cuban, etc., would see Sotomayor in confrontation with the Senate as a fellow latina rather than a puertorriqueña and be advised thereby that the Republican Party was a White man’s party.

In which case we may assume the Republicans have recovered their old-time death wish and are marching bravely onward towards the sunset.

It doesn’t appear there’s a republican in the Senate worth a hill of beans.  They are, everyone of them…. BOUGHT OUT hacks.  Some worse than others to be certain, but the lot of them, hacks.

Then we have these dirty dogs, “blue dogs” in the House, AGAIN…. hacks, the lot of them.

This isn’t about Sotomayer, its about the “supremes” and I’m not referring to Diana Ross’ group here, nor am I referring to the highest court in the nation.  Think “supremacist” opposition when you think “supreme” here.

The dynamic is kind of interesting since most Hispanics self-identify by nationality.  In Arizona, that would mean Mexican.  Sotomayor is Puerto Rican.