Memo to the New York Times: If you are going to publish editorials whining about the Republicans’ “dishonest discussion” of judicial nominees, you should try yourselves to refrain from engaging in dishonest rhetoric. Let’s take a look at a specious claim slipped into today’s lead editorial attacking judicial nominees Priscilla Owen and Janice Rogers Brown:

On the bench, Justice Brown – a black woman raised in segregated Alabama – is a consistent enemy of minorities…

Here we go with the sellout smear again.

What concrete evidence does the NYTimes provide to back up its cheap shot? Read the editorial yourself. Maybe the proof is written in invisible ink? Do we need iodine to uncover it? A MicroDot reader?

At least the left-wingers at People for the American Way attempt to make their case with citations here.

The Coalition for a Fair Judiciary defends Rogers’ record with citations here. An excerpt:

People v. McKay- Justice Brown, in a lone dissent, voted to overturn the drug conviction of an individual stopped by the police for riding his bicycle the wrong way down a one-way street.

Justice Brown believed that the actions of the police in this case amounted to racial profiling, and, if allowed to stand, could lead to more instances of discriminatory law enforcement. She wrote: “If we are committed to a rule of law that applies equally to minorities as well as majorities, to the poor as well as the rich, we cannot countenance standards that permit and encourage discriminatory enforcement.”

People v. Woods- Justice Brown dissented in this case, arguing for the exclusion of evidence obtained during a warrantless search of a person’s home based on consent given by the person’s roommate. In the opinion, Brown noted: “In appending the Bill of Rights to the Constitution, the framers sought to protect individuals against government excess . . . . By their decision today, a majority of this court set the history of personal liberties back more than 200 years and resurrect a specter of the general warrants and writs of assistance so abhorred in England and the American Colonies – the very impetus of the Fourth Amendment.”

Kasler v. Lockyer- Justice Brown wrote the opinion of her court upholding California’s assault weapons ban, despite her legal view that the Second Amendment protects an individual’s right to own firearms. The NRA attacked Justice Brown in a series of television commercials that ran in California following the decision.

The Times labels Brown an “extreme right-wing ideologue,” plays the Aunt Tomasina card, and expects the public to take the editorial board at its smug word. “Dishonest” debaters? Glass. House. Stones.

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Related:

Judging Janice Rogers Brown
Estrada Redux
Thomas Sowell on Janice Rogers Brown Pt I II III
Captain’s Quarters on Justice Rogers’ recent speech and the MSM’s biased coverage and more from Benedict Blog on the event.

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