Yes, but what kind of toilet paper does she use and how will it influence her rulings. Just when you think they can't lower the bar any more.....

Friendly amendment:

"it's clear a few too many on the right have had a few too many."

Perhaps Sotomayor should skip the rice and pork and gorge on the beans prior to her confirmation hearing, then subject her unhinged inquisitors with silent opinions on their intellect.

I am partial to 'huevos con chirizo' and 'chile verde'. Obviously imparts a racial aspect to my thinking as an older white male.

Clearly she will not be able to rule fairly in cases involving Big Pig!

It could be worse. She could like arugula in her salad, Dijon mustard on her hot dog, or Swiss on her cheesesteak.

Ignorance is bliss for you people.

Laugh all you want, but we in the medical profession have known for years that spicy food of the kind eaten by Puerto Ricans, Mexicans and other immigrants has negative effects on mental performance.

Too many hot peppers makes for hotheadedness. Cumin and chiles cloud the reasoning process, whether you lefties admit it or not.

Wonder how many right wingers will demand that a Natalie Wood type play Judge, soon to be Justice, Sotomayer in a film about her life?

Mikey, you've identified the primary problem with Obama's predecessor. George W. Bush's favorite cuisine is Mexican, and as a health professional you should contact him immediately to inform him of the damaging effects this toxic food is having on his brain. The nation, and the Bushes, owe you a debt of gratitude for pointing this out.

Why is The Hill publishing articles by The Onion? Do they have some sort of joint operating agreement?

Laugh all you want, but we in the medical profession have known for years that spicy food of the kind eaten by Puerto Ricans, Mexicans and other immigrants has negative effects on mental performance.

It takes a lot to make me laugh so early in the morning (especially when it's raining and your foot hurts), but thanks for this Myke. I really think you should call the FDA and have them label chilis WMDs. *nods seriously and non-sarcastically*

Richard Nixon reportedly liked to put ketchup on cottage cheese, so maybe there is a connection between menu choices and governance.

Ah, but will conservatives demonstrate a similar scrutiny between the ill-gotten prescription diet of their Dear Leader, Kim Jong Limbaugh, and his broadcast responsibilities?

THAT should be the question of the moment....

If it's true that you are what you eat, we now have an explanation why Bush had the intellect of a cow.

Republicans should cut to the chase and put forward their pick for supreme court justice: Ronald McDonald.

Ronald only eats American food, so we know he's on the right side of the law. He's a clown so the base will love him, and he's as white as the stripes on the flag. He's perfect.

Richard Nixon reportedly liked to put ketchup on cottage cheese, so maybe there is a connection between menu choices and governance.

That is actually a myth. He put A1 Steak Sauce on his cottage cheese, which is just as bad.

I'm partial to carnitas and authentic Oaxacan mole negro, myself, so I guess I can give up any high court aspirations.

Wonder how many right wingers will demand that a Natalie Wood type play Judge, soon to be Justice, Sotomayer in a film about her life?
Posted by: berttheclock

With singing voice, of course, dubbed by Marni Nixon.

mmmmmole negro. (Looking around hungrily) Who says it's not for breakfast?

Ah, yes, the marvelous Marnie Nixon of Seattle - She was such a "My Fair Lady", as well.

I believe that suspicion by the medical community about Mexican cuisine affecting the brain is from that splendid article from the New England Journal of Medicine concerning Gonzo. "Gonzo went Bonzo, Que"

arroz, gandoles y pernir -- rice, beans and pork

Yum.

(Though I thought the latter was called "pernil.")

Dam, just realized that be being nothing but a Repiglican Shitstain it has affected my ability to reason .. now I realize that I simply snivel stupidity as I splutter on pretending that I can indeed reason ........

Don't even think about getting between me and my cuchifritos.

I think you're right, Steve M., pork roast is pernil, at least in Mexico and Central America. And gondoles is a new one on me also.

Shortstop wrote:
> He put A1 Steak Sauce on his cottage cheese, which is just as bad.
Indeed. Everyone knows it's Heinz 57 for cottage cheese.

i've got yer dijon mustard right here.....
the new york times reports: "Today, Judge Sotomayor’s culinary tastes range from tuna fish and cottage cheese for lunch with clerks in her chambers, to her standard order at the Blue Ribbon Bakery: smoked sturgeon on toast, with Dijon mustard, onions and capers......"

swiped from john cole....

@ Andy Re: Nixon... Everyone loves to trash him , but by today's standard he was a flamin' LIBRUL. among other things he created Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, instituting racial quotas and preferences through the Labor Department's "Philadelphia Plan," and supporting the National Endowment for the Arts. He also developed a policy toward Native Americans that is still in place today, proposed a Family Assistance Program to provide a guaranteed income to welfare recipients, and, after the 1972 election, implemented wage and price controls. Finally, Nixon cut a deal with House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Wilbur Mills to increase Social Security payments and index them to inflation, which Barone called a "tremendous piece of public policy" that lifted elderly people out of poverty.

Best pork cooking is from Michoacan where they have plenty of rendered lard. Ah, carnitas cooked in lard. Almost as good as fish and chips cooked the same way.

However, as I ate some "smokies", yesterday, with the excellent Roland's Dijon mustard slathered atop, your point, dj spellchecka?

I think current Republicans have Alzheimers. They have lost all ability to think logically.

John R wrote:

> Everyone loves to trash him , but by today's standard he was a flamin'
> LIBRUL. . . .

I entirely agree with you that, on many points, Nixon was saner than the current leaders of the GOP. But I remain unconvinced that being on the right side of all those things you mentioned absolves the very real, if somewhat less tangible, damage he did to his own office, to the federal government generally, and to the country as a whole.

Times do change, but there are fundamental and universal truths that know no bounds of time, culture or history. Steak sauce on cottage cheese is still disgusting.

You're all being too quick to judge the Gopers on this. They're quite right. All too often we ignore the dietary choices of our politicians when considering them at our own peril. For example, had we but known that Cheney breakfasted on the hearts of infants, preferred a lunch of puppy-tartare, and regularly dined on the souls of the innocent, I think we could have seen long ago where his policy choices might lead us all.

So many wins on this thread. Thanks for the laughs, guys!

I have yet to see a comment on this that points out that she must have said "muchoS platoS..." (although Puerto Rican s's can be hard to hear). Didn't anybody in this country ever take Spanish 101? By the way, it sounds delicious.

They couldn't even bother to check their spelling. Yes, as far as I know -- and I have been eating Spanish food when I could find decent stuff for twenty five years -- it is "gandUles" not 'gandoles' and 'perniL,' not 'pernir.'

I wonder what they would have said if she had announced a preference for 'ropa vieja' a wonderful stew of shredded beef and peppers, but which translates, roughly, as 'old rope.'

Btw, Steve, you make the same mistake 'they' do. Unlike Mexican food, "Carribean Spanish" (Puerto Rican, Dominican and Cuban, particularly) is well seasoned, but not particularly 'hot' they don't use chili peppers that much. (Carribean ENGLISH food, i.e., Jamaican does, but that's a completely different cuisine.)

This relates to the issue of "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." That wasn't a racist comment, because racism is the idea that other races are inherently inferior etc. Racism isn't about the salutatory effect of differing and special "experiences." Note that conservatives hate broad definitions of "racism" that make it easier to rope in people the conservatives say (often rightly) don't deserve the label.

It could be a sort of "reverse cultural chauvinism", but it is not "racism." Even then, who would criticize e.g. a military man who said, "I would hope a battle-tested wise old soldier would more often ... reach better conclusions than a civilian who never had to face warfare" etc? There's nothing outrageous about claiming that your experiences gave you greater wisdom than the crowd has. It could be from military service, it could be from going through the great depression, it could be from being an ethnic minority, or being a woman in a man's world - or any combination thereof.

tyrannogenius

Unlike Mexican food, "Carribean Spanish" (Puerto Rican, Dominican and Cuban, particularly) is well seasoned, but not particularly 'hot' they don't use chili peppers that much.

Right. And "Spanish food," as you call it, includes such things as tapas, paella, sherry, manchego cheese, serrano ham...

A friend of mine has a horribly bigoted old father who hates every non-Anglo Saxon. He once denigrated some acquaintances by announcing that they "live like Spaniards," which still puts my friend and me in hysterics every time we think of it. Oh, to live like a Barcelonan...

The conservatives' risible (to quote George Will, who thinks he's so clever for using words like that) concern for SotamayOR's eating habits shows their simple-minded abuse of logic. Since SS said that she's informed by her ethnic-related experiences, ergo *all* of them carry significant weight. Conservatives can't parse ideas like "some of", subdivisions within a category, etc. Their sophomoric, caricature-Aristotelianism is mirrored in their simplistic moral calculus, such as it is.

To repeat something I read on a blog recently (sorry, don't recall where), the unspoken assumption on the right seems to be that white, straight males' perspective is the default, neutral, "normal" one, and that anyone else's is therefore both suspect and likely to upset the well-ordered, established system.

If there's ever been a better argument for upsetting that particular apple cart, just on principle, I haven't heard it.

This relates to the issue of "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life."

Neil, Your comment is true regarding the quote, but omits the critical point that the quote is taken out of context. Her speech was saying "I would hope....blahblah, BUT...." - essentially, this is how one would naturally feel, but as a judge one has to recognize this human tendancy and transcend it.

Frankly, I think it's reprehensible the conservatives are cherry picking this, and it's inexcusable of the media to let them get away with it unchallenged.

OK, wait... When I was in PR a couple of years ago, I'm pretty sure beans were called abichuela. Anybody know if this is a different kind of beans?

HoneyBear K: While your at the counter, get me a couple of alcapurrias, and if they have a good rellenos de papa...

Well, even the update's Spanish terms for the dishes are incorrect.

The phrase that reads "mucho platos de arroz, gandoles y pernir..." should read "muchos platos de arroz con gandules y pernil" (many dishes of rice with pigeon peas and roast pork shoulder).