Deval Patrick's Empathy and Obama's Supreme Court

Obama is searching for a Supreme Court justice with "empathy" -- so we're sure he'll seriously consider Mass. Gov. Deval Patrick. A few days ago, we recounted Patrick's appearances at Boston Pride and a Harvard Law School GLBT candidate forum. For more on Patrick's support of transgenderism, we reprint our Sept. 21, 2006 post: "DEVAL PATRICK'S RECKLESS PROMISES" (to transgender activists):

Seems that Deval Patrick will promise anyone anything. Take the example of "trans rights". At the Harvard forum on GLBT issues, he told a "trans" attendee, "You need to teach me how you experience it in your life.… I’m all for extending the laws, but how to get at the issue, what to tell my prosecutors to do, what to tell my bureaucrats to do, you need to educate me on that, that’s all.” In other words, just tell me whatever your latest lunatic radical demand is, and I'll do it for you.

From Bay Windows, "Pressing the Flesh: Patrick, Gabrieli go at it on gay issues," Sept. 14, 2006:

The question of how to protect transgender people from discrimination in housing, employment, public accommodations and credit under state law also teased out a difference between the candidates. Though both agreed that the state’s hate crimes laws should be expanded to protect those who are victimized on the basis of gender identity, Gabrieli flatly stated he wants to ensure that “our civil rights protections include gender identity and gender expression,” while Patrick approached the issue more cautiously, acknowledging that transgender issues were an area “where I have a lot of work to do.”

“I can’t see limiting our civil rights laws so that they exclude those who identify across gender,” he said “But frankly, beyond that principle and that approach there is honestly a lot I’ve got to do to understand exactly how we need to come up with, and in what context, and how then we change not just our legislation but our practices so it really does get at the issues people are facing in their lives.”...

Patrick’s statement that he needed further education on transgender rights raised a flag for at least one audience member. Following the forum, Jakobi Gorham, a 24-year-old Northeastern University student who works at Harvard’s science center, approached Patrick to discuss the issue. “If you deeply believe that people are people regardless of what the issues are, it set me back, and it actually hurt me for you to say that you need to educate yourself,” Gorham told the candidate.

“I’m sorry to hear you say that,” Patrick replied. The candidate then explained that he supports expanding the state’s laws to protect transgender people, but said, “how you enforce that, how that comes up in your life, you need to teach me that. I know how it comes up in the life of the gay kid or a lesbian. I know that. You need to teach me how you experience it in your life. … I’m all for extending the laws, but how to get at the issue, what to tell my prosecutors to do, what to tell my bureaucrats to do, you need to educate me on that, that’s all.”