This will sound odd. And it's a mea culpa of sorts. But I actually have shifted more towards your position on Clarence Thomas. And one of the shifts was because of how Ketanji Brown-Jackson was treated during her confirmation hearings last year. And I did not like that and I didn't like how she as denigrated and how she was viewed as somehow being a voice for African Americans and black women in particular.
She's there to do her job as a Supreme Court Justice (it's why she and Justice Gorsuch have joined each other's concurring and dissenting opinions a few times this year). She's not there to be a representative of black women. And expecting that of her is demeaning. But also, just in general, the whole process felt demeaning to her and to all black women, especially black women lawyers. It made me angry.
But it also got me thinking about my own attitudes. I treated Clarence Thomas this way that I abhored. This made me realize my own prior attitudes (what you'd expect from any white liberal) towards Clarence Thomas were wrong. (Which doesn't mean I am a fan suddenly, I still don't like him or agree with much of his judicial philosophy). I get why some of the attacks and assumptions against him bother you. And I'm no longer adhering to that.
Please accept this white liberal Democrat's apology.
I note that while you suggest that C. Thomas should be honored and lauded for his accomplishments, you do not cite any of them beyond his ability to hold a job for 30 years, one to which he was appointed for life by the way. That ain't much of an accomplishment.
Being born 'poor' (he was raised by his grandfather, a successful small businessman) ain't much of an accomplishment either.
Refusing to recognize the right of habeas corpus for Guantanamo prisoners is an accomplishment, but one of entirely the wrong sort.
Signing onto the decision to hand Bush the presidency when the constitution clearly states that the federal government has no role in determining the winner of elections in the various states was an accomplishment that is not only the wrong sort but egregiously wrong. That is so wrong I can see it from here.
The list goes on. And the current spate of sins for which he has been exposed ain't nothing neither.
I don’t know the etiquette about naming buildings after people who are still living. Maybe California will be the first state with a “Clarence Thomas High School”. I saw video documentary- “Created Equal”, currently available on Amazon and Youtube. While Ginsberg and Thomas both seem likable- I don’t know anything about their Supreme Court work and am not qualified to say which among the nine should have buildings named after them.
Justice Thomas and I have something in common, both of our fathers had an occupation as farmer.
After seeing the ordeal that Kavenough went through regarding dubious sex-abuse accusation, I retroactively became more sympathetic towards Thomas. On Maureen Dowd’s misinformation about non-validated sex-abuse accusations, I have reached my tolerance limit of liberals’ defamatory remarks. Supposedly Ginsberg, Sotomayor and Thomas had no problem sitting 10-feet away from a White Supremacist coworker 5 days a week.
Ginsberg helped liberate and empower women. Thomas liberated and empowered no one. He made it very difficult for young poor women to get abortions. Middle class women can still find a way.
The Supreme Court is the only way that out-of-control state legislatures can be reined in. It is so ironic that a black man is limiting voting rights on the basis of “States rights”. Gerrymandering being an important current problem.
On the other hand, Thomas is a political event, not a moral example. Slowing “Woke” excesses is a work of common sense, not a work of genius.
Also "anti-Black" == in the world according to Clarence Thomas there would be at least short-term concrete harms to Black people. He was part of the gutting of the VRA for goodness' sake.
Ben Carson's name could be on the high schools, etc. and this would make Glenn's point. I voted for Clinton in 1992 precisely because of that nomination because it was so cynical. Bush, Sr. made the nomination daring the Senate to vote against Thomas because he was Black even though he did not have a developed judicial philosophy on many things. Clearly in recent times presidents have figured out that they need to nominate people with no clear records on many of the issues the Court is asked to decide.
I believe Anita Hill and the other women that the Senate Judiciary Committee failed to call for testimony because Thomas played on white guilt like a fiddle. Perhaps one can argue whether sexual harassment is disqualifying, but the taint of perjury and more recently corruption means Justice Thomas will never be revered in the way Professor Loury advocates.
I remember Clarence Thomas answering a very common question people had about him.
He was speaking before a group of students; it was Q&A time. (I can't recall if it was high school or college. This was probably 20+ years ago.)
"Why don't you speak more during sessions, Justice Thomas?"
The question we ALL *wanted* to ask, even those of us who regularly defended him against critics who insisted his silence was proof he had no business on the Court in the first place: "He's unqualified!" "He's Scalia's lapdog!" (You know the routine.)
This was back when Bill Maher was hated by today's anti-woke 'conservatives'. (Yes, Maher used to crap on Clarence Thomas, too. Alan Dershowitz was even worse. Times do change.)
These were ridiculous assertions in my view, and still are. They used to really piss me off.
In any case, Thomas proffered what I thought was a fair answer:
"Look. It's not like we haven't read these cases already. We know them quite well. Moreover, I have astute colleagues who often ask the questions I have in mind. That being the case, I see no point in speaking just to hear my own voice. That would be a waste of the Court's time." (paraphrased)
That answer suggested to me that Clarence Thomas genuinely cared about the legitimacy of the Supreme Court, even if it meant being subjected to unwarranted opprobrium on a regular basis.
But that was then and this is now, and it's time to get real. Between his decades-long Harlan Crow excursions and apparent conflicts of interest vis-à-vis his wife, it is plain and obvious that Thomas doesn't value that ideal very much if at all.
Had Glenn made this proclamation a year ago, I would have been among the first to endorse. But new information has a way of changing things.
This. This is the real problem. Plenty of people knee-jerk dislike Thomas because they don’t like the idea of a black conservative. (And even among conservatives Thomas is CONSERVATIVE.) But dig a bit deeper and not only these extremely serious ethical concerns--which I believe that Glenn uncharacteristically just pushes to the side--but also an abyss between Thomas’ public statements about how he would judge, how the law should be applied to people, etc. and how he’s actual behaved and decided cases over the past 30 years. Liberals don’t need to smear him; he’s done that to himself.
I am shocked and appalled daily by what I hear in the legacy News Media each day. I just want to know when common sense went out the window and crazy progressive liberals took over?! I always considered myself a center left liberal but find the Democratic Party to be evil to the core and wish the conservatives would find a way to get their message across. Never thought I would say that!!! Leave Justice Thomas alone please, he has accomplished so much. Thank you for addressing this.
I get it Glenn- the reactions to the Justice are in many respects unfair and even racist to a point. I don’t agree with him at all on most issues and find his personal behavior to be marginal in its respect for the Court, but ridicule is not a mature adult response to his life and record. Naming stuff after him is a bridge too far. It’s not exactly a participation trophy at the the level of the Court, but saying he should be rewarded for 30 years of yeoman like service is not, in my opinion, appropriate. He is a positive role model for many, and especially for black men of all ages for his rising to the level he has. That’s it.
Whatever message you are trying to send the fact that the audience you are reaching is overwhelmingly white should tell you that the message being received is precisely the one you claim not to be sending absolving white people of their racism.
Of course. Racism is not a sin. Racism is ... NORMAL !!! And of course the Great Replacement is a real problem for your White Christian Power Structure. For which the cure is of course ethnic cleansing (peaceful but if they won't go peacefully well ...)
Race should have nothing to do with naming schools or any other award recognition. True social justice should be as blind as legal justice. If you want actual equality, real parity, then there can be no double standards, not in 2023. We're seeing what happens when those are applied all over Wokedom.
If Thomas has violated ethical whatevers, he takes the fall for it — he certainly needs to be investigated, just as Epstein did, and countless other Whites, Asians, Latinos. Anita Hill had a right to be heard, but if Andrew Cuomo goes down for the same thing, so should have Thomas. I don't approve of America's extreme puritanism — but I don't take the blame for my Puritan ancestors any more than I do a Southerner's slave-owning ancestors — but that's the way things are here. If you want double standards, that's okay, but there can never be true equality as well — equality is about balance, across the board.
Also, anecdotal fallacies — "I know him; he's a great man; he's not like that" — are no argument, I'm sorry. I was raised in an establishment Republican household. There's plenty that people on the outside don't see.
i'll bet $100 that his concurring opinion - on my Substack page, too long for here - is the real reason for this vilification campaign - it's monopolists fighting dirty to protect their monopolies...
Rising from unbelievable poverty and circumstances, Justice Clarence Thomas is an important, indeed, towering figure in contemporary life and in American history. The fact that he is a black conservative that believes in anachronisms like free markets, hard work and the Constitution has earned him the unrelenting hatred of the "progressive" left. This tells you more about progressives than about Thomas, who occupies a belief set squarely in the center of traditional American thought and values.
Your response sums up everything that I wanted to say about Justice Thomas with one exception : Justice Brennan is lionized today as a great former Justice because of his "social justice" jurisprudence which in my opinion is a total perversion of the original intent of the Constitution. Justice Thomas, on the other hand, has carried the baton of Justice Scalia and added greatly to the original intent jurisprudence. He will be long remembered by students and scholars of American Constitutional Law regardless of his race.
The obituaries of both Thomas and Kavanaugh will include the sexual allegations. Having a school named in their honor will be a heavy lift. Thomas is also tainted by the gifts he received from a billionaire who collects Nazi memorabilia.
There are schools named for Colin Powell and Ralph Bunche, both Black conservatives.
That's what I thought. For a moment I got the impression that you thought Powell was racially motivated when he voted for Obama. Glad I caught myself😎
Anyway, the term "conservative" has lost a ton of its meaning, practically speaking. It's almost useless today. It used to connote free markets, individual liberty, a strong military, family values (so-called), respect for tradition, thrift (at least with social causes), evolutionary-change-over-revolutionary-change, etc.
But THOSE days are *gone*. Basically, the only people who use the term "conservative" today are old school intellects like Glenn.
In 2012, GOP primary hopefuls went out of their way to identify themselves as conservative--it was like watching a cult. But by 2016, Trump brought all of that to a screeching halt, and his opponents followed suit. The term was no longer politically beneficial; they had to change course and make way for the new GOP.
If the Republican Party is still "conservative", it's a different type of conservatism. More "paleo" than "Reagan" or "Bush".
"Conservative" as represented by Barack Hussein Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Joe Biden?
Yes, I agree with you that Colin Powell, who endorsed and supported each of them to lead this country, assuredly operated under a different definition of the term than any I'm familiar with.
I wonder if it’s more accurate to say perhaps conservative politicians and judges simply come across to the news media and academia as disgusting people.
I think there are ordinary citizens who have similar feelings about Conservatives. Marjorie Taylor Greene feeling “threatened” by Jamal Bowman fits a stereotype of Conservative white women. The members of Moms for Liberty fit a similar M.O.
Are those your best arguments? Ridiculous allegations and a "gift from a billionaire (presumably an automatic negative) who collects Nazi memorabilia?" With standards like those, there isn't an important American who would qualify for your purity test.
Clarence Thomas---portrait of an angry, self-hating, and vengeful man. Why is he so anti-black? He recently wrote a scathing 50-page dissent on a majority court ruling preserving the 1964 Voting Rights Law.
Four years before his Supreme Court nomination, Clarence Thomas gave an interview with Juan Williams. Thomas said “There is nothing you can do to get past black skin. I don’t care how educated you are, how good you are at what you do – you’ll never … be seen as equal to whites.” The best interpretation of this is that Thomas feels the law is not going to save Black people from white people. Blacks, in Thomas’ view, should be self reliant. He voted to gut the Civil Rights Act and wanted Alabama to continue to rig the voting system against Blacks. The message, the “white” law is not your friend.
Clarence Thomas was accused of sexual harassment. He had no problem using the so-called race card to divert attention from the accusation. Clarence Thomas has no problem accepting gifts from Harlan Crow. He has no problem not recusing from cases that involve issues supported by his wife. He is the living embodiment of “rules for thee, but not for me”
Clarence Thomas is a super meritorious manumission negro. Under meritorious manumission social policies, black slaves were rewarded with freedom for informing whites about black rebellions and escapes. Some were memorialized with plaques and monuments. One informed on the hiding of abolitionist John Brown, which led to his capture and hanging. I'm aware of these comments that Clarence Thomas made to Juan Williams. From what I have researched about Thomas, he's very angry, vengeful, contradictory, and self-loathing. Light-skinned black people reportedly teased him during his early years about his pronounced black physical features. After obtaining his law degree from Yale, he got frustrated with trying to find employment, believing that he earned the degree based on affirmative action. The other black Yale law school graduates didn't feel this way. Thomas was taken under the wing of a white conservative politician from Missouri and groomed for meritorious manumission. Interesting is the fact that Thomas speaks highly of his grandfather who was involved with the NAACP and abused him. Thomas is on the record for making scathing comments about the NAACP. Thomas appears to have unresolved psychological issues regarding race.
Clarence Thomas, aka “America’s Blackest Child”, aka ABC is indeed interesting. You can view him as being akin to Malcolm X, who felt white society would never create laws or political parties that truly benefited Black people. On the other hand, Thomas could be viewed as a self-hating Black man as described in Frank Fanon’s “Blacks Skin, White Masks”. At the end of the day, you have Clarence Thomas the most rightwing member of the Supreme Court.
John Danforth, then the Republican Senator from Missouri found employment for Thomas. From Thomas’ autobiography, “My Grandfather’s Son”: “I learned the hard way that a law degree from Yale meant one thing for white graduates and another for blacks, no matter how much anyone denied it,” Thomas writes. “I’d graduated from one of America’s top law schools, but racial preference had robbed my achievement of its true value.”
Thomas was one of about 10 Black students in a Yale Law class of about 160. Thomas seems to have been the runt of the litter. The runt is complaining about being undervalued. Does Thomas realize that he is an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States?
Graduates from Yale. He says he had good grades, but still could not get a job. A United States Senator gets him a job. Thomas sits on the Supreme Court, a lifetime appointment. He is still bitter. Black Conservative George Schuyler wrote “Black No More” in 1931. The main character in the novel goes to a for profit clinic that transforms Black people into white people. After the conversation, the character works with white supremacists to label Black people the major problem in the country. Clarence Thomas would love some “Black No More” treatment.
Who cares what people collect, no matter how weird? You either believe in people's freedom to make their own choices or not. Are you implying that Thomas is some kind of neo-nazi because his friend has weird (though legal) collecting tastes? For that matter, has Harlan Crow ever said anything to support fascism? And the very loose association with such a collection reduces Thomas to pariah state and ineligible to have a school named after him, regardless of his accomplishments? Give me a break.
Moving onto gifts, it is the responsibility of the donor to report gifts, not the recipient. There is currently no limit on donor gifts. Yet another strikeout for the Progressive left, who want to silence conservative black voices instead of engaging them in productive debate.
Take a deep breath. Crow can collect whatever he wants. Crow has a relationship with Thomas so the collection becomes important. Obama had a relationship with Rev. Wright, so the sermons became important.
If it is the responsibility of the donor to report, Crow is refusing to provide a list to the Senate.
(Deep breath being taken...) Reverend Wright's sermons (some of which I've read) are an excellent analogy with Crow's collecting nazi memorabilia, if indeed Crow does. While most Americans found Wright's sermons distasteful or worse, it did not destroy Obama's legacy, and the same should be true of Thomas. Whatever is between Crow and the Senate (or the law) is their business and does not reflect on Thomas, any more than Obama's association with terrorist Bill Ayers and Rod Blagojevich reflect directly on the reputation of President Obama.
Glenn, you will appreciate this: https://maxkanin.substack.com/p/did-united-states-supreme-court-justice (Coming from a liberal who's only ever voted Democratic)
This will sound odd. And it's a mea culpa of sorts. But I actually have shifted more towards your position on Clarence Thomas. And one of the shifts was because of how Ketanji Brown-Jackson was treated during her confirmation hearings last year. And I did not like that and I didn't like how she as denigrated and how she was viewed as somehow being a voice for African Americans and black women in particular.
She's there to do her job as a Supreme Court Justice (it's why she and Justice Gorsuch have joined each other's concurring and dissenting opinions a few times this year). She's not there to be a representative of black women. And expecting that of her is demeaning. But also, just in general, the whole process felt demeaning to her and to all black women, especially black women lawyers. It made me angry.
But it also got me thinking about my own attitudes. I treated Clarence Thomas this way that I abhored. This made me realize my own prior attitudes (what you'd expect from any white liberal) towards Clarence Thomas were wrong. (Which doesn't mean I am a fan suddenly, I still don't like him or agree with much of his judicial philosophy). I get why some of the attacks and assumptions against him bother you. And I'm no longer adhering to that.
Please accept this white liberal Democrat's apology.
I note that while you suggest that C. Thomas should be honored and lauded for his accomplishments, you do not cite any of them beyond his ability to hold a job for 30 years, one to which he was appointed for life by the way. That ain't much of an accomplishment.
Being born 'poor' (he was raised by his grandfather, a successful small businessman) ain't much of an accomplishment either.
Refusing to recognize the right of habeas corpus for Guantanamo prisoners is an accomplishment, but one of entirely the wrong sort.
Signing onto the decision to hand Bush the presidency when the constitution clearly states that the federal government has no role in determining the winner of elections in the various states was an accomplishment that is not only the wrong sort but egregiously wrong. That is so wrong I can see it from here.
The list goes on. And the current spate of sins for which he has been exposed ain't nothing neither.
Your friend,
John
I don’t know the etiquette about naming buildings after people who are still living. Maybe California will be the first state with a “Clarence Thomas High School”. I saw video documentary- “Created Equal”, currently available on Amazon and Youtube. While Ginsberg and Thomas both seem likable- I don’t know anything about their Supreme Court work and am not qualified to say which among the nine should have buildings named after them.
Justice Thomas and I have something in common, both of our fathers had an occupation as farmer.
After seeing the ordeal that Kavenough went through regarding dubious sex-abuse accusation, I retroactively became more sympathetic towards Thomas. On Maureen Dowd’s misinformation about non-validated sex-abuse accusations, I have reached my tolerance limit of liberals’ defamatory remarks. Supposedly Ginsberg, Sotomayor and Thomas had no problem sitting 10-feet away from a White Supremacist coworker 5 days a week.
California? More like the last state!
Thank you for this. I've been a Clarence Thomas fan since his confirmation hearings, in which he was treated like absolute crap by Joe Biden.
Ginsberg helped liberate and empower women. Thomas liberated and empowered no one. He made it very difficult for young poor women to get abortions. Middle class women can still find a way.
The Supreme Court is the only way that out-of-control state legislatures can be reined in. It is so ironic that a black man is limiting voting rights on the basis of “States rights”. Gerrymandering being an important current problem.
On the other hand, Thomas is a political event, not a moral example. Slowing “Woke” excesses is a work of common sense, not a work of genius.
"My Grandfather's Son" will enlighten you.
Also "anti-Black" == in the world according to Clarence Thomas there would be at least short-term concrete harms to Black people. He was part of the gutting of the VRA for goodness' sake.
Ben Carson's name could be on the high schools, etc. and this would make Glenn's point. I voted for Clinton in 1992 precisely because of that nomination because it was so cynical. Bush, Sr. made the nomination daring the Senate to vote against Thomas because he was Black even though he did not have a developed judicial philosophy on many things. Clearly in recent times presidents have figured out that they need to nominate people with no clear records on many of the issues the Court is asked to decide.
I believe Anita Hill and the other women that the Senate Judiciary Committee failed to call for testimony because Thomas played on white guilt like a fiddle. Perhaps one can argue whether sexual harassment is disqualifying, but the taint of perjury and more recently corruption means Justice Thomas will never be revered in the way Professor Loury advocates.
I remember Clarence Thomas answering a very common question people had about him.
He was speaking before a group of students; it was Q&A time. (I can't recall if it was high school or college. This was probably 20+ years ago.)
"Why don't you speak more during sessions, Justice Thomas?"
The question we ALL *wanted* to ask, even those of us who regularly defended him against critics who insisted his silence was proof he had no business on the Court in the first place: "He's unqualified!" "He's Scalia's lapdog!" (You know the routine.)
This was back when Bill Maher was hated by today's anti-woke 'conservatives'. (Yes, Maher used to crap on Clarence Thomas, too. Alan Dershowitz was even worse. Times do change.)
These were ridiculous assertions in my view, and still are. They used to really piss me off.
In any case, Thomas proffered what I thought was a fair answer:
"Look. It's not like we haven't read these cases already. We know them quite well. Moreover, I have astute colleagues who often ask the questions I have in mind. That being the case, I see no point in speaking just to hear my own voice. That would be a waste of the Court's time." (paraphrased)
That answer suggested to me that Clarence Thomas genuinely cared about the legitimacy of the Supreme Court, even if it meant being subjected to unwarranted opprobrium on a regular basis.
But that was then and this is now, and it's time to get real. Between his decades-long Harlan Crow excursions and apparent conflicts of interest vis-à-vis his wife, it is plain and obvious that Thomas doesn't value that ideal very much if at all.
Had Glenn made this proclamation a year ago, I would have been among the first to endorse. But new information has a way of changing things.
This. This is the real problem. Plenty of people knee-jerk dislike Thomas because they don’t like the idea of a black conservative. (And even among conservatives Thomas is CONSERVATIVE.) But dig a bit deeper and not only these extremely serious ethical concerns--which I believe that Glenn uncharacteristically just pushes to the side--but also an abyss between Thomas’ public statements about how he would judge, how the law should be applied to people, etc. and how he’s actual behaved and decided cases over the past 30 years. Liberals don’t need to smear him; he’s done that to himself.
Clarence Thomas has disturbing unresolved issues.
https://www.blackagendareport.com/glen-ford-clarence-thomas-anti-black-2007
I am shocked and appalled daily by what I hear in the legacy News Media each day. I just want to know when common sense went out the window and crazy progressive liberals took over?! I always considered myself a center left liberal but find the Democratic Party to be evil to the core and wish the conservatives would find a way to get their message across. Never thought I would say that!!! Leave Justice Thomas alone please, he has accomplished so much. Thank you for addressing this.
You have no problem with Thomas receiving gifts and refusing to recuse?
You have no problem with Jared and Ivanka enriching themselves while in the White House?
Edited: replaced Jarrod with Jared
Thanks
Corrected Jarrod to Jared
I get it Glenn- the reactions to the Justice are in many respects unfair and even racist to a point. I don’t agree with him at all on most issues and find his personal behavior to be marginal in its respect for the Court, but ridicule is not a mature adult response to his life and record. Naming stuff after him is a bridge too far. It’s not exactly a participation trophy at the the level of the Court, but saying he should be rewarded for 30 years of yeoman like service is not, in my opinion, appropriate. He is a positive role model for many, and especially for black men of all ages for his rising to the level he has. That’s it.
Thank you. #SanityRocks
Whatever message you are trying to send the fact that the audience you are reaching is overwhelmingly white should tell you that the message being received is precisely the one you claim not to be sending absolving white people of their racism.
Of course. Racism is not a sin. Racism is ... NORMAL !!! And of course the Great Replacement is a real problem for your White Christian Power Structure. For which the cure is of course ethnic cleansing (peaceful but if they won't go peacefully well ...)
Race should have nothing to do with naming schools or any other award recognition. True social justice should be as blind as legal justice. If you want actual equality, real parity, then there can be no double standards, not in 2023. We're seeing what happens when those are applied all over Wokedom.
If Thomas has violated ethical whatevers, he takes the fall for it — he certainly needs to be investigated, just as Epstein did, and countless other Whites, Asians, Latinos. Anita Hill had a right to be heard, but if Andrew Cuomo goes down for the same thing, so should have Thomas. I don't approve of America's extreme puritanism — but I don't take the blame for my Puritan ancestors any more than I do a Southerner's slave-owning ancestors — but that's the way things are here. If you want double standards, that's okay, but there can never be true equality as well — equality is about balance, across the board.
Also, anecdotal fallacies — "I know him; he's a great man; he's not like that" — are no argument, I'm sorry. I was raised in an establishment Republican household. There's plenty that people on the outside don't see.
Here's a damned good reason he should be honored - https://streamfortyseven.substack.com/p/facebook-and-twitter-should-be-regulated
i'll bet $100 that his concurring opinion - on my Substack page, too long for here - is the real reason for this vilification campaign - it's monopolists fighting dirty to protect their monopolies...
Rising from unbelievable poverty and circumstances, Justice Clarence Thomas is an important, indeed, towering figure in contemporary life and in American history. The fact that he is a black conservative that believes in anachronisms like free markets, hard work and the Constitution has earned him the unrelenting hatred of the "progressive" left. This tells you more about progressives than about Thomas, who occupies a belief set squarely in the center of traditional American thought and values.
Your response sums up everything that I wanted to say about Justice Thomas with one exception : Justice Brennan is lionized today as a great former Justice because of his "social justice" jurisprudence which in my opinion is a total perversion of the original intent of the Constitution. Justice Thomas, on the other hand, has carried the baton of Justice Scalia and added greatly to the original intent jurisprudence. He will be long remembered by students and scholars of American Constitutional Law regardless of his race.
I agree, assuming American Constitutional Law as we know it survives the current left-wing assault.
The obituaries of both Thomas and Kavanaugh will include the sexual allegations. Having a school named in their honor will be a heavy lift. Thomas is also tainted by the gifts he received from a billionaire who collects Nazi memorabilia.
There are schools named for Colin Powell and Ralph Bunche, both Black conservatives.
No problem for Clinton or Kennedy or MLK though. Powell was not a conservative. Not crazy left either.
Odd then that "conservative" Colin Powell voted twice for Barack Hussein Obama for president. I wonder what the two had in common...
More on "conservative" Powell's political acts: https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/18/politics/barack-obama-colin-powell-2008/
"I wonder what the two had in common"
Sanity? That's what you meant, right?
That's what I thought. For a moment I got the impression that you thought Powell was racially motivated when he voted for Obama. Glad I caught myself😎
Anyway, the term "conservative" has lost a ton of its meaning, practically speaking. It's almost useless today. It used to connote free markets, individual liberty, a strong military, family values (so-called), respect for tradition, thrift (at least with social causes), evolutionary-change-over-revolutionary-change, etc.
But THOSE days are *gone*. Basically, the only people who use the term "conservative" today are old school intellects like Glenn.
In 2012, GOP primary hopefuls went out of their way to identify themselves as conservative--it was like watching a cult. But by 2016, Trump brought all of that to a screeching halt, and his opponents followed suit. The term was no longer politically beneficial; they had to change course and make way for the new GOP.
If the Republican Party is still "conservative", it's a different type of conservatism. More "paleo" than "Reagan" or "Bush".
"Conservative" as represented by Barack Hussein Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Joe Biden?
Yes, I agree with you that Colin Powell, who endorsed and supported each of them to lead this country, assuredly operated under a different definition of the term than any I'm familiar with.
Perhaps Conservative politicians and judges simply come across to the public as disgusting people.
I wonder if it’s more accurate to say perhaps conservative politicians and judges simply come across to the news media and academia as disgusting people.
I think there are ordinary citizens who have similar feelings about Conservatives. Marjorie Taylor Greene feeling “threatened” by Jamal Bowman fits a stereotype of Conservative white women. The members of Moms for Liberty fit a similar M.O.
Are those your best arguments? Ridiculous allegations and a "gift from a billionaire (presumably an automatic negative) who collects Nazi memorabilia?" With standards like those, there isn't an important American who would qualify for your purity test.
LOL
How many Americans have received gifts from billionaires who collect Nazi memorabilia?
There is also the issue of not reporting the gifts
I think the overwhelming majority of important Americans could pass that standard
Clarence Thomas---portrait of an angry, self-hating, and vengeful man. Why is he so anti-black? He recently wrote a scathing 50-page dissent on a majority court ruling preserving the 1964 Voting Rights Law.
https://www.blackagendareport.com/glen-ford-clarence-thomas-anti-black-2007
Four years before his Supreme Court nomination, Clarence Thomas gave an interview with Juan Williams. Thomas said “There is nothing you can do to get past black skin. I don’t care how educated you are, how good you are at what you do – you’ll never … be seen as equal to whites.” The best interpretation of this is that Thomas feels the law is not going to save Black people from white people. Blacks, in Thomas’ view, should be self reliant. He voted to gut the Civil Rights Act and wanted Alabama to continue to rig the voting system against Blacks. The message, the “white” law is not your friend.
Clarence Thomas was accused of sexual harassment. He had no problem using the so-called race card to divert attention from the accusation. Clarence Thomas has no problem accepting gifts from Harlan Crow. He has no problem not recusing from cases that involve issues supported by his wife. He is the living embodiment of “rules for thee, but not for me”
Clarence Thomas is a super meritorious manumission negro. Under meritorious manumission social policies, black slaves were rewarded with freedom for informing whites about black rebellions and escapes. Some were memorialized with plaques and monuments. One informed on the hiding of abolitionist John Brown, which led to his capture and hanging. I'm aware of these comments that Clarence Thomas made to Juan Williams. From what I have researched about Thomas, he's very angry, vengeful, contradictory, and self-loathing. Light-skinned black people reportedly teased him during his early years about his pronounced black physical features. After obtaining his law degree from Yale, he got frustrated with trying to find employment, believing that he earned the degree based on affirmative action. The other black Yale law school graduates didn't feel this way. Thomas was taken under the wing of a white conservative politician from Missouri and groomed for meritorious manumission. Interesting is the fact that Thomas speaks highly of his grandfather who was involved with the NAACP and abused him. Thomas is on the record for making scathing comments about the NAACP. Thomas appears to have unresolved psychological issues regarding race.
Clarence Thomas, aka “America’s Blackest Child”, aka ABC is indeed interesting. You can view him as being akin to Malcolm X, who felt white society would never create laws or political parties that truly benefited Black people. On the other hand, Thomas could be viewed as a self-hating Black man as described in Frank Fanon’s “Blacks Skin, White Masks”. At the end of the day, you have Clarence Thomas the most rightwing member of the Supreme Court.
John Danforth, then the Republican Senator from Missouri found employment for Thomas. From Thomas’ autobiography, “My Grandfather’s Son”: “I learned the hard way that a law degree from Yale meant one thing for white graduates and another for blacks, no matter how much anyone denied it,” Thomas writes. “I’d graduated from one of America’s top law schools, but racial preference had robbed my achievement of its true value.”
Thomas was one of about 10 Black students in a Yale Law class of about 160. Thomas seems to have been the runt of the litter. The runt is complaining about being undervalued. Does Thomas realize that he is an Associate Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States?
Graduates from Yale. He says he had good grades, but still could not get a job. A United States Senator gets him a job. Thomas sits on the Supreme Court, a lifetime appointment. He is still bitter. Black Conservative George Schuyler wrote “Black No More” in 1931. The main character in the novel goes to a for profit clinic that transforms Black people into white people. After the conversation, the character works with white supremacists to label Black people the major problem in the country. Clarence Thomas would love some “Black No More” treatment.
Who cares what people collect, no matter how weird? You either believe in people's freedom to make their own choices or not. Are you implying that Thomas is some kind of neo-nazi because his friend has weird (though legal) collecting tastes? For that matter, has Harlan Crow ever said anything to support fascism? And the very loose association with such a collection reduces Thomas to pariah state and ineligible to have a school named after him, regardless of his accomplishments? Give me a break.
Moving onto gifts, it is the responsibility of the donor to report gifts, not the recipient. There is currently no limit on donor gifts. Yet another strikeout for the Progressive left, who want to silence conservative black voices instead of engaging them in productive debate.
Take a deep breath. Crow can collect whatever he wants. Crow has a relationship with Thomas so the collection becomes important. Obama had a relationship with Rev. Wright, so the sermons became important.
If it is the responsibility of the donor to report, Crow is refusing to provide a list to the Senate.
Are you really serious about this?
(Deep breath being taken...) Reverend Wright's sermons (some of which I've read) are an excellent analogy with Crow's collecting nazi memorabilia, if indeed Crow does. While most Americans found Wright's sermons distasteful or worse, it did not destroy Obama's legacy, and the same should be true of Thomas. Whatever is between Crow and the Senate (or the law) is their business and does not reflect on Thomas, any more than Obama's association with terrorist Bill Ayers and Rod Blagojevich reflect directly on the reputation of President Obama.
Obama gave a speech addressing Reverend Wright’s sermon.