URGENT REMINDER: The fundraiser for reopening the National Black Doll Museum ends February 28. If you are able to donate a few dollars please do, and either way, please share the fundraiser link as widely as you can. Many thanks! ☮️ -Iris.

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Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson
(image: Kevin Lamarque/AFP/Getty Images)

We are presently witnessing Black history being made, with President Biden’s nomination of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court. Some facts I have learned (from various sources):

Jackson was born in Washington, D.C. and raised in Miami, where she attended public schools. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (public education is in crisis in this country, and that fact is important.)

She is 51, the daughter of former public school teachers, and has been married to surgeon Patrick G. Jackson since 1996. They have two young adult daughters. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (a working mother.)

If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, she would be the first Black woman to serve on the high court.⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (diversity & representation FTW.)

She would also be the first Justice to have served as a public defender. Her federal public defense experience includes defending those dastardly “enemy combatants” at the U.S. federal prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (I remember the shit lawyers and major law firms got from clients and the media for doing those cases pro bono. They were reviled.)

She would be the first justice since Thurgood Marshall with any criminal defense experience. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (this court has the power to stop executions. Or not.)

From 2010 to 2014, Jackson served as vice chair of the (bipartisan) U.S. Sentencing Commission. There she is said to have “played a key role in major criminal justice reforms… [including joining] a unanimous vote to reduce federal sentencing guidelines for some nonviolent drug offenders and make the changes retroactive.” ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (baby steps, but in the right direction.)

She presently sits on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. Jackson was nominated last year by Biden for the seat, which was vacated by now-Attorney General Merrick Garland. She was confirmed by the Senate with Republican support. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (clearly qualifying judicial experience.)

Jackson wrote the 118-page ruling against the Trump administration attempt to block former White House counsel Don McGahn from complying with a Congressional subpoena. She ordered McGahn to testify, writing “Stated simply, the primary takeaway from the past 250 years of recorded history is that presidents are not kings.” ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (though Trump will never accept this, I’m glad Judge Jackson does; it points to anti-authoritarian tendencies, which conservatives hate.)

 

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via ABC News:

Jackson has been vetted and confirmed by the Senate three times – twice for appointments to the federal bench, a third time for a seat on the U.S. Sentencing Commission. Not since Justice Clarence Thomas was nominated in 1991 has a Supreme Court candidate been scrutinized by the Senate as many times.

JUST A COINCIDENCE I AM SURE. Pffft.

Here’s another fact: There are only 11 Black senators. No, not right now, silly! That’s 11 in the entire 232-year history of the U.S. Senate. Presently there are three, and none of them are women.

Jackson is a former clerk to retiring Justice Stephen Breyer, whose seat she would fill. Regarding Breyer, she said: “Justice Breyer, the members of the Senate will decide if I fill your seat. But please know that I could never fill your shoes.” Dear Lard let us hope she is wrong about that, and that she more than fills Breyer’s shoes, she fills Ginsburg’s too.

In summary, I hereby approve this candidate for the position of Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.

-Iris Vander Pluym
Senator, President, and
Chairperson of the Board of Directors
Death to Squirrels

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There is now a lot of partisan and media speculation about whether the Senate will confirm her FOR THE FOURTH TIME and how difficult it will be. We can expect that to ratchet up significantly. Ugh. It’s the horse race style of “journalism” where the press all sound like sports announcers who only love the game and could not care less about the outcome, as if nothing important were ever at stake. And to be fair, nothing usually is – for them. They also reveal their biases by pretending (or deluding themselves) that they do not to have any, typically by sins of omission. Why, it’s almost as if being white, relatively wealthy, native born, and cisgender were neither a political nor personal identity! No, theirs is simply the neutral, normal, bias-free point of view (*cough* white supremacist capitalist patriarchy *cough*). It’s any deviation from this that’s biased! The dreaded scourge of identity politics!!!!11!1!!

OBVIOUSLY.

Personally, I am worried about Judge Jackson’s confirmation, because The New York Times said in its email briefing this morning that “Republicans appear unlikely to put up a contentious fight over Jackson’s nomination,” and they are almost always wrong about these things. Remember when every last NYT columnist, pundit, and the entire Editorial Board were all utterly certain Hillary Clinton would beat Trump? Right up until election returns started rolling in? HAHA GOOD TIMES. (And reason number 4,358,562 I hate The New York Times.)

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Although I reeeeeally do not want to, I feel I would be remiss if I did not at least address the geysers of racist/sexist/misogynoir being aimed at Judge Jackson. Although I will not be posting any of it here, I will describe an example.

An infamously nasty and immensely popular FoxNews host spat forth one of his usual racist/white supremacist, anti-historical, apocalyptic rants about Judge Jackson’s nomination. I am linking here to a Guardian article that quotes the quotes, but again, I will not be posting them here. [CONTENT NOTE: see the first sentence of this paragraph.]

I want to point out that what fuckface said, he said on one of the top-rated cable news shows in the country to approximately 3.5 million viewers. This is not some obscure right-wing racist slimepit on the internet. I do admit to being a tiny bit curious, however, regarding what this shithead thinks of Justice Clarence Thomas, an off-the-rails right-wing, willfully ignorant, lightweight very much like himself, only Black. That would shed light on the question of whether his butthole is so painfully puckered over Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s race, gender or (my bet!) both.

Wait! I changed my mind! I am going to quote something the fascist motherfucker said. I believe neither this brief quote by itself nor the context as I describe it below requires a content warning. However, if I am wrong about that I would be grateful to know and will update the post accordingly.

The context: after multiple attacks impugning the president’s patriotism – I mean, say what you will about Joe Biden, I highly doubt there is any evidence that he hates the U.S. and is purposefully working to destroy it, except in the fevered dreams of conservatives who confuse said dreams with, you know, reality – the doucheweasel says, “Do you want to live in that country?”

Well, no. I would not want to live in the country this chucklefuck describes, but fortunately for all of us, that country doesn’t exist. (At least, not anymore. A case can certainly be made that it did indeed exist under Biden’s predecessor. PROJECTION: it’s what’s for dinner.)

But I do not want to live in a country where this is true, either:

Week of Feb. 14 Cable Ranker: Fox News Continues to Average Most Viewers on All of Cable TV

And yet here we are.

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Congratulations to Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson on her well-deserved nomination. May her confirmation be swift and painless.

Long may she serve, and serve us all well.

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Day 1 of Black History Month 2022 (Lori Teresa Yearwood) is here.
Day 2 (Mallence Bart-Williams) is here.
Day 3 (Emmett Till) is here.
Day 4 (A Tale of Two Citizens) is here.
Day 5 (Trayvon Martin) is here.
Day 6 (Franchesca Ramsey) is here.
Day 7 (National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day and the Black Aids Institute) is here.
Day 8 (extreme racial disparities in marijuana arrests) is here.
Day 9 (Summer of Soul/1969 Harlem Cultural Festival) is here.
Day 10 (current and historic racist domestic terrorism, Steve Phillips/Democracy in Color) is here.
Day 11 (Gee’s Bend Quilters) is here.
Day 12 (egregious anti-Black (& anti LGBTQ+) behavior at a NY State high school is here.
Day 13 (Erin Jackson, 1st Black woman to win Olympic gold medal in speedskating) is here.
Day 14 (Stevie Wonder’s Innervisions) is here.
Day 15 (racial inequities in spiking vehicle death rates during the pandemic compound and are compounded by other racial inequities, and The New York Times buries the lede) is here.
Day 16 (criminalizing protest/Color of Change) is here.
Day 17 (Flo Kennedy) is here.
Day 18 (3 news stories on the same day regarding police killings of Black people) is here.
Day 19 (Andrew Joseph III/qualified immunity) is here.
Day 20 (Dr. Catherine L. Pugh/”There Is No Such Thing As A White Ally”) is here.
Day 21 (Black cowboys, Black rodeo and photographer Justin Hardiman) is here.
Day 22 (National Black Doll Museum of History & Culture fundraiser) is here.
Day 23 (“Helping” and four petitions) is here.
Day 24 (Black Americans you probably don’t know of, but should) is here.
Day 25 (Reparations Awareness Day/EJI’s Segregation in America) is here.