Okay, I'm not weighing in on Sotomayor's viability for the court.  Let's just say I'm so Republican (but the nice kind that I tend to agree doesn't really exist anymore in the national power structure of the party) that I'd probably not like it even if Obama brought Fred Rogers back to life and nominated him. 

Paul Levinson and Don Rich (sorry, I can't do links!) have provided excellent political analyses of the situation; my response is really more of a tangent.

As I understand the story (OS is my only source thus far), the court case that is causing all the controversy stemmed from a high school student being disciplined at school for something she wrote on a blog.  From what I understand, this blog would have been written in her home, outside school hours, on a computer her parents own.  Apparently, a school administrator's son found the student's blog through a Google search, read it, and then gave it to his administrator parent.

This whole thing is disturbing to me on several levels that have nothing to do with freedom of speech or the Supreme Court.

1.  Why are schools still finding ways to inflict school-based discipline on students for things they do outside school, off school property?  This was getting started about 15 years ago when I was in high school.  I remember everyone who wanted to do any extracurricular activities being required to sign a form forfeiting privileges if they got in trouble with the law.  Even outside school grounds.  Even over the summer.  Even away on vacation in another state.  Did I mention this was a public school?

2.  The role of the school, the state, and free speech has been discussed, but what about the divide between the state and the family?  I'm assuming this student wrote the blog at home on a computer she and her parents own--if it was a school computer, someone let me know and I'll strike this.  Unless a student comes to school in some way presenting evidence of abuse, that which goes on in the home is not the business of the school.  A public school is a government agency.  It is not appropriate for a government agency to be disciplining children for things they do in their parents' homes--is no one else frightened by this?

3.  Why in the world would a school administrator's son (apparently himself an adult, ick) be Googling for and then reading the blog of a high school student who is, oh yeah, a child?  What in the world is wrong with this administrator, an older-than-their-adult-child adult, for reading the blog once it came to her attention?

3a.  This is an issue I argue about a few times a year with various groups of academic colleagues.  Yes, we all know everything you put on the internet, even with privacy settings, becomes public.  You will notice I blog under a pseudonym and don't include my location, birthday, or picture.               

                  However, I still maintain that, unless someone stumbles across a student's Facebook page and finds death threats or something else actually dangerous (and in that case you call the police, not the principal), that it is just wrong and weird for teachers/administrators to be looking at their students' social web activities, and thus students should no be eligible for punishment at school for anything they do online (or, which doesn't seem to be the case here but bears remembering, anything someone else does with their image and without their knowledge online).

                   Heck, my students are adults, just like I am, and I don't go looking at their webpages for the same reason I don't follow them home from class and stare in their front windows--common decency and a basic sense of boundaries. 

                 I hope this kid gets to be on a few news shows, and I hope that the supposed adults running her high school think twice about their internet habits and feel very, very ashamed of themselves.