Cornyn: Calling Sotomayor Racist is "Terrible"

Look, I'm sure Senator John Cornyn's a nice guy, but he's ending up on the wrong side of some things lately.

"Clueless Cornyn," as he's been called elsewhere, gave the early endorsement for Charlie Crist's GOP Senate bid in Florida, kneecapping up-and-comer Marco Rubio.

Now Cornyn's taking on Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich for suggesting Sonia Sotomayor is a "racist." But note something important here: It's not like Newt Gingrich, a former House Speaker, is some right-wing extremist; and Rush Limbaugh's got his pulse on the conservative beat. That their criticisms of Sotomayor are dead on just makes Cornyn's howling even more ridiculous. How long are folks like Cornyn going to cave to the left-wing propaganda that the GOP needs to "moderate"?

Raul Bosque, my friend and former student, left a comment on my previous post, "It's Sotomayor's Ethnic Authenticity, and Shut Up About It!."

Raul answers the question of whether Sotomayor's indeed "racist":

She is a racist. The problem is no one has the courage to label an Hispanic woman as such and the left knows it. She's somewhat shielded by popular opinion and by the MSM. As an Hispanic, I have no problem calling her and La Raza what they are, radical leftists and racist scum, I wish the Republicans will grow a pair and call her out on it.

Interestingly, Senator Cornyn has responded to the pushback against the Crist endorsement, at at Red State. Here's a key snippet:

Some believe that we should be a monolithic Party; I disagree. While we all might wish for a Party comprised only of people who agree with us 100 percent of the time, this is a pipedream. Each Party is fundamentally a coalition of individuals rallying around core principles with some variations along the way. My job as Chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee is to recruit candidates who have the best chance of winning and holding seats – and to do so in as many states as possible. Earlier this month, two Republicans candidates emerged for the open Senate seat being vacated by Mel Martinez in the Sunshine State: Marco Rubio, the young and talented Hispanic former Speaker of the state House, and Charlie Crist, the state’s popular Governor.

Although Cornyn's discussing the NRSC's decision in the Florida Senate race, the larger "big tent" meme of GOP ideological moderation reflects the underlying tension between the party honchos and the conservative base.

The GOP has lost its backbone, if not its soul. John Cornyn's wrong in attacking critics of Sonia Sotomayor and in disregarding the hunger at the base for real conservative Senate candidates. Florida's primary is August 24, 2010. Sotomayor may have long been seated by that time, but conservatives can send a message to the national party bosses by electing Marco Rubio as Florida's Republican Senate nominee.