Cory Booker is either playing dumb, or his United States History degree from Queen’s College, Oxford is about as meaningful as AOC’s Bachelor of Arts degree in economics.  On Ketanji Brown Jackson’s third day of Senate confirmation hearings, Cory Booker brought the nominee to tears with his over-the-top rhetoric and grandstanding.  In the process, Booker shows he don’t know much about the Supreme Court Senate confirmation history.  Prior to 1987, most Supreme Court Senate hearings were a relative dog-and-pony show with the President’s pick given a pro forma looksee before being confirmed.  I might be wrong, but Cory Booker almost certainly graduated high school in 1987 and given his Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford, my guess is that he was no dummy.  Therefore, he was probably aware that the confirmation of Robert Bork was anything but cordial.  In fact, the failure to confirm Judge Bork led to the verb “bork” in modern dictionaries everywhere.  Ironically, from the Oxford Languages Dictionary, the definition of bork is:

1. obstruct (someone, especially a candidate for public office) by systematically defaming or vilifying them.

   ““We’re going to bork him,” said an opponent”

Therefore, I laughed out loud when I read the following from Booker in the AP article on Wednesday evening:

“You faced insults here that were shocking to me,” Booker said, speaking directly to Jackson, who is nominated to become the first Black woman on the high court.

Let’s just start there.  Really sir?  I watched the VERY respectful opening remarks by Josh Hawley.  If this is insulting, I need to be insulted a bit more every day by the people who disagree with me.

I listened to @HawleyMO below and read @AndrewCMcCarthy's well-written piece. I have to say I side with Hawley. He was astute and articulated numerous cases which show a pattern. Andrew's piece was basically his opinion but nothing Hawley noted was false.https://t.co/hvAyYnW2MA

— Justin Hart (@justin_hart) March 21, 2022

Booker, the failed 2020 Presidential Contender went on like he was preaching at a Baptist revival camp in Mississippi. I can almost see Booker waving a bible in one hand and wiping his brow with a kerchief.

“Nobody’s taking this away from me,” Booker continued, choking up as he spoke. Republicans are “gonna accuse you of this and that. But don’t worry, my sister. Don’t worry. God has got you. And how do I know that? Because you’re here, and I know what it’s taken for you to sit in that seat.”

Did he just say that while Judge Clarence Thomas, the second black Supreme Court justice, may or may not still be hospitalized with an infection?  I guess Judge Thurgood Marshall’s life as a black man was a cake walk, having been born in the uber Black-friendly city of Baltimore, MD and graduating HIGH SCHOOL the same year my father was born, 1933.  Yeah, I’m thinking Ketanji’s life was not radically different than mine (I know, I know – I am NOT allowed to say that!)  But for Christ’s sake.  She was born in 1970, just like I was, and was raised in Miami freaking Florida.  Her parents were both graduates of historically black colleges and universities according to Wikipedia, so it wasn’t exactly like Elvis’s “In the Ghetto” home-life!

“As the snow flies
On a cold and gray Chicago mornin’
A poor little baby child is born
In the ghetto
(In the ghetto)

And his mama cries
‘Cause if there’s one thing that she don’t need
It is another hungry mouth to feed
In the ghetto
(In the ghetto)”

The Senate confirmation process, led by our current Ficus in Chief, led Judge Thomas to say this about the process:

“And from my standpoint, as a black American, as far as I’m concerned it is a high-tech lynching for uppity blacks who in any way deign to think for themselves, to do for themselves, to have different ideas, and it is a message that unless you kowtow to an old order, this is what will happen to you.”

But the Associated Press just could help but add their own editorialization of their “news piece”

“But Booker used his remarks to ground Jackson’s elevation to the Supreme Court in a significance beyond simple diversity. In order for Jackson to sit before the panel, he said, she had to overcome systemic barriers and overachieve at every level. Only then could she have the chance to break through one of the last remaining racial ceilings in American democracy.”

I guess Senator Booker didn’t think Thurgood or Thomas had to overcome systemic barriers and overachieve to get to THEIR positions?  Being born a black woman in 1970 (which gender she cannot define for us) had to be infinitely harder than being born a black man (I’m sure she would be happy to define that gender for us) in 1908 or 1948 respectively.

Then, I am sure that Cory Booker just overlooked our charitable Vice President’s rude interjections to Chuck Grassley’s introduction to Brett Kavanaugh:

Fireworks erupt at beginning of Brett Kavanaugh hearing https://t.co/3ACN7ETII6 via @YouTube watch Kamala Harris disrupt confirmation hearing for Justice Kavanaugh

— Teresa W (@TeresaW23242427) March 23, 2022

The last thirty-five years of Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominees have been rancorous and divisive.  From being “borked” to two sexually charged allegations re: Thomas and Kavanaugh to religiously intolerant attacks on Amy Comey-Barret, Democrats have landed more punches to Supreme Court nominees than Republicans ever will.  So, when I hear Booker’s hypocritical and overwrought sermons on the mount, I just have to roll my eyes when he says:

“I want to tell you, when I look at you, this is why I get emotional,” Booker said. “I’m sorry, you’re a person that is so much more than your race and gender. You’re a Christian. You’re a mom. It’s hard for me not to look at you and not see my mom. I see my ancestors and yours.”

He needs to brush up on that US History degree that I am sure is well framed and hanging in his office.  Seriously, I cannot even…

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Feature Photo Credit: Donkeyhotey via Flickr.com, cropped and modified