Taegan Goddard's Political Wire

May 01, 2009

Sotomayor The Front-Runner?

First Read on Obama's first Supreme Court pick: "There appear to be four categories of candidates Obama will consider: Two have to do with identity politics (a woman and a Latino), and two have to do with life experience (an experienced legal scholar and a politician). As a candidate, the president seemed to hint that he wanted somebody with a ton of intellectual bona fides, as well some normal life experience. Still, the pressure he'll receive from Hispanics is going to be enormous -- bigger than the pressure women's groups might put on him. Of course, there's one candidate that checks both boxes: Sonia Sotomayor. She's got to be the pundit front-runner, and folks will be Googling to death over the next few hours."

"And note this: Hispanic Democratic leaders are pleased, but not necessarily ecstatic with the number of Latino appointments Obama has made so far. If he bypasses a Latino, what will the political fallout be? Will it be greater than if he bypasses a woman? Then again, if he picks the first Latino to sit on the Supreme Court, what will that mean for a Democratic Party that's already winning the GROWING Hispanic vote by a 2-to-1 margin."

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Taegan D. Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites.

Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.

Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country, including the Washington Post, USA Today, Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, Chicago Tribune, Philadelphia Inquirer and Christian Science Monitor.

Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.

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