Opinion: In today’s pages: Tiller, Sotomayor and Obama
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The Times editorial page today points out that General Motors’ bankruptcy filing is a chance to make a formal, forceful break with a history of inferior workmanship and design that has tattered its reputation. The public is willing to forgive a car company for its financial failings, but only if it makes cars people want to buy.
We also weigh in on the murder of Dr. George Tiller, which is being used by pro-choice groups as an opportunity to bash abortion opponents -- suggesting that the responsibility for his death is shared by the entire pro-life movement. Some arguments from anti-abortion groups are thinly veiled incitements to violence, but ‘it’s unfair to ask abortion activists to muffle their message because it might inspire an unbalanced individual to commit an atrocity.’
Finally, we note that the election of Mauricio Funes as president of El Salvador, who represents a party that was once a Marxist guerrilla group that fought for 12 years against U.S.-backed governments, isn’t quite the grim news for American interests that it may appear. Funes is an admirer of President Barack Obama who has stocked his cabinet with economic pragmatists.
On the Op-Ed page, columnist Jonah Goldberg says the hubbub over Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor’s statements about her superior wisdom as a Latina gives liberals the chance to have that dialogue on race they’re always saying they want to begin -- yet they’re running away from the issue as fast as they can.
Robert Satloff, executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, gives President Obama some tips about what to say and do during his Middle Eastern trip. Such as: Don’t fall for the illusion that there’s such thing as the ‘Muslim world,’ and focus instead on practical country-by-country strategies.
Finally, Gina M. Solomon, a senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, bemoans the Schwarzenegger administration’s proposal to shut down a small state agency -- the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment -- that costs next to nothing to run but that has made dramatic strides in protecting Californians from dangerous chemicals.