now here is an astoundingly strange column by the krauthammer. the first thing he does is work hard to cultivate our empathy for ricci, which is the right way to show that injustice has been done, which it has been. i was writing the second half of the column in my head: the decision, and some of her remarks, call into question the universality of sotomayor's empathy; if she can empathize for the most part only with members of certain (historically-oppressed) groups, this affects the quality of the justice she dispenses. instead, after massively mobilizing our empathy, the hammer just condemns it as irrelevant.