<p>I think JHS is talking about a different kind of “preparation” for the appointment. Perhaps “positioned” is the word to use.</p>
<p>Nobody said that Scalia, Alito, or Roberts was unprepared. They did say it about Harriet Miers, though. But Thomas was an interesting case, in which the injection of race made people say things that were blatantly untrue. </p>
<p>But just to bring it back to the topic–nobody thinks that Thomas was chosen for the Supreme Court in order to atone for past discrimination against blacks, or to represent the point of view of most black people. I suppose, in a sense, he was chosen for the purposes of “diversity,” because there was this sense that this was the “black” seat on the Supreme Court. But Thomas would not have made the top 50 candidates if he had been white. Was this good or bad use of a racial classification? That’s a political question, I guess.</p>