By Sherman Frederick/Battle Born Media
President Joe Biden nominated Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court. 
As with all appointments to SCOTUS, Judge Jackson was a purely political appointment. But President Biden took the usual political litmus test a step further by also putting qualifications secondary to the right physical plumbing and skin color. This appointment had to be a black female. No Asian trans males need apply. Forget it if you’re Native American. And for gawd’s sake, don’t even think about it if you’re white man.
So, it is sad to say, Judge Jackson comes to the forefront of American attention with a fair amount of skepticism going against her. That’s what happens when you begin the search by saying 90+ percent of the qualified applicants need not apply.
That being what it is, I want to highlight Judge Jackson’s comments at her unveiling. I thought they were pretty damn good and expressed in a way that you don’t hear enough from minority liberals who seem to always start by telling us what a crummy country we live in.
So, kudos to Jackson for beginning her journey to nomination like this:
“I must begin these very brief remarks by thanking God for delivering me to this point in my professional journey. My life has been blessed beyond measure and I do know that one can only come this far by faith. Among my many blessings, and indeed the very first, is the fact that I was born in this great country.
“The United States of America is the greatest beacon of hope and democracy the world has ever known. I was also blessed from my early days to have had a supportive and loving family. My mother and father, who have been married for 54 years, are at their home in Florida right now and I know that they could not be more proud.”
That, ladies and gentlemen, was nice to hear.
SLAVE REPARATIONS
The idea of making amends for American slavery is a hot topic and if California is any indication, it’s going to be wildly contentious.
For example, California’s nine-member slavery reparations task force planned to debate who in the Black community should get paid first. One idea is that those who can prove they are, indeed, direct descendants of slaves would get first priority in payment. Then, everyone else with a claim would be dealt with later.
Calmatters.org reports that “In a sign of just how controversial that decision could be,” it took a 5-4 vote for the nine-member committee just to set the next meeting.
San Diego Councilmember Monica Montgomery Steppe: “We have to deal with the direct harm that occurred to the enslaved.”
Dr. Cheryl Grills, a psychology professor at Loyola Marymount University, countered: “How will we possibly be setting people up to be left out of reparations because they cannot establish that lineage? We’re going to reduce ourselves yet again to the masters’ tools.”
Masters’ tools? Yikes!
With that kind of division and rhetoric, stand by for a wild debate, even among liberal states like California in which the elected officials there are, you know, pretty much inclined to do it.
ONE MORE THING
– Nevadans would be better off if we ate more vegetables … and elected less of them.
– Pro Tip: A good way to get out of a conversation is to take off one of your socks and hand it to the person talking.
– A dyslexic man walks into a bra …
Thanks for reading, everybody. See you next week. Until then, avoid soreheads, laugh a little and always question authority.
Sherman Frederick is a Nevada Hall of Fame journalist and co-founder of Battle Born Media, a news organization dedicated to the preservation of community newspapers. You can reach him by email at shermfrederick@gmail.com.
