Meritocracy

In today's New York Times, David Brooks posted a great op-ed piece about meritocracy. Of course, his exhibit A is the US Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor. But what Brooks forgot, I think, was not only the compelling issues of ethnicity but also her gender.

Practicing law as a woman in the early 1980s was no picnic. Law firms, even government prosecuting offices, did not have maternity leaves. It was a rare even to see a woman elected to partnership, much less a woman made head of a prosecutor's division. To just tread water, women had to work twice as hard and be even more perfect.

Sonia Sotomayor has had to sacrifice a lot of living in order to be sitting at the table, being grilled by privileged white men who have had wives, aides, children take care of their every need. Which, in my opinion, makes them less able to judge this amazing woman's ability to be a Supreme Court Justice.