Supreme Court Candidate Sonia Sotomayor (First in a Series?)

Now this is helpful information about a judge. It's been a little sports-heavy around here lately (apologies?), but this is sports-meets-justice. Sonia Sotomayor, one of the judges supposedly on the list of candidates to replace David Souter on the Supreme Court, ended the Major League Baseball strike in 1995. Nice credential.

She also has the kind of personal story that is genuinely inspiring:

[She] grew up in a Bronx housing project, a child of Puerto Rican immigrants. . . . Her father died when she was 9, leaving her mother to raise her and a brother. In speeches to Latino groups over the years, Judge Sotomayor has recalled how her mother worked six days a week as a nurse to send her and her brother to Catholic school, purchased the only set of encyclopedias in the neighborhood and kept a warm pot of rice and beans on the stove every day for their friends. She loved Nancy Drew mysteries, she once said, and yearned to be a police detective. But a doctor who diagnosed her childhood diabetes suggested that would be difficult.

Couple of things here: First, I'm sure her decisions tend liberal, but her background should appeal to conservatives who champion the idea that America allows its lower classes to move up with hard work and determination. (After all, Bobby Jindal titled his response to Obama's address to Congress: "Americans Can Do Anything.") Secondly, she's still diabetic (takes insulin daily), and despite the fact that she's only 54, I would think that might be an issue in confirming her. In any case, filling a Supreme Court vacancy is always fascinating.