We have a half black President, our previous secretary of state was a black woman; we currently have a woman serving as our secretary of state for this president. We've had two female supreme court justices. When does race and gender stop playing a part in decisions that should be based on merit? Your gender doesn't make you qualified, just as your race does not. Isn't that what the whole affirmative action movement was about - to base decisions on people's qualifications and ensuring that people had equal access to those opportunities? We do have equal access. Merits should be the deciding factor. It should not matter that Sotomayor is Hispanic, or that she is female. What should matter is her ability to judge cases fairly and adhere to the Constitution of the United States. Can she evaluate the merits of each case and make decisions about the legal issues as they apply to the US Constitution? If she is the best PERSON for the job, her ethnicity and her gender do not matter.

Making decisions about someone's capabilities based on their race and gender is exactly the opposite of the goals of the Civil Rights of 1964.

Get with the program America. Using anything other than qualifications and merits to judge someone's capabilities is a slippery slope that our country does NOT and should NOT go down.