Obama's Pick From the Start

Worth Clicking: Blasts from the past wound Romney

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May 26, 2009

Obama's Pick From the Start

According to Marc Ambinder, Judge Sonia Sotomayor was President Obama's first choice for the Supreme Court as far back as just after the presidential election.

In recent weeks, the president told White House officials "that he could be talked out of picking Sotomayor if they convinced him that she wasn't the right person for this moment in time."

"It turns out, though, that Obama's advisers loved the idea of picking Sotoamyor just as much as Obama did. The pick, they believed, would tell a story about justice in the 21st century. Her hard-scrabble upbringing, combined with her tough-as-nails realism, combined with her respect for the rule of law, combined with her academic achievements, combined with her -- yes -- identity as an Hispanic female -- provides a walking, talking counterpoint to the clubby formalism of the modern Supreme Court."

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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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May 26, 2009