A Quote by Nina Totenberg

I saw a Harry Reid statement saying, there's nothing in the Constitution that says the Senate has to act on any presidential nominee. Well, that was back when President Bush was president and vice versa. So this is not a pretty carrying-on at the moment.
If you look at the Constitution, the two clauses of the Constitution make it very clear the president shall nominate, and the Senate shall provide advice and consent. It's been since 1888 that a Senate of a different party than the president in the White House confirmed a Supreme Court nominee.
The Constitution says the President shall nominate, not maybe he could, maybe he can't, he shall nominate. Implicit in the Constitution is that the Senate will act on its constitutional responsibility and give its advice and consent. No one is required to vote for the nominee.
I would hope that the Senate would do its job and confirm the nominee that President [Barack] Obama has sent to them. That's the way the Constitution fundamentally should operate. The president nominates, and then the Senate advises and consents, or not, but they go forward with the process.
Experts are saying that President Bush's goal now is to politically humiliate Saddam Hussein. Why don't we just make him the next Democratic presidential nominee?
My dad challenged every president from President [Dwight] Eisenhower and Vice President [Richard] Nixon to President [J.F] Kennedy, Vice President [Lindon] Johnson to President Johnson and Vice President [Hubert] Humphrey. It`s challenging the administrations to do the right thing.
I understand the politics of the situation, I think that many Republican members of the senate believe that,get out the vote move. They can indicate that they're strong for their base. But the Constitution's pretty clear. The president Donald Trump has to nominate someone. The senate can choose to disapprove. There's nothing in their Constitution that says the grounds upon which they must vote. But to refuse even to meet with the individual, or to have the process go forward, that's just pure politics.
Now, President Obama has to make a decision. He can either propose a nominee who can win over the majority in the Senate or defer his choice to the voters, who in November will elect a new President and a new Senate, which will be responsible for confirming a nominee who will provide balance to the Supreme Court.
They've got a Jobs Council that never meets. A Democratic Senate that doesn't act. A President who doesn't believe and a Vice President who won't stop talking. They just don't get it.
When it comes to the Supreme Court, the American people have only two times when they have any input into how our Constitution is interpreted and who will have the privilege to do so.First, we elect a president who has the power to nominate justices to the Supreme Court.Second, the people, acting through their representatives in the Senate, have their say on whether the president's nominee should in fact be confirmed.
I really think the Patriot Act violates our Constitution. It was, it is, an illegal act. The Congress, the Senate and the president cannot change the Constitution.
Harry Reid employed the so-called nuclear option, broke the Senate rules to change the Senate rules, lowered the threshold for confirmation from 60 votes to 51 votes. And it is a direct result of Harry Reid that we now have the most conservative Cabinet in decades.
In an interview with Rolling Stone, Senator John Kerry, who is running for president, said that when he voted for the war in Iraq, he didn't expect President Bush to 'f--- it up as badly as he did.' Here's some breaking news, tomorrow former Vice President Al Gore expected to endorse Howard Dean as the Democratic nominee for president of the United States - and you thought John Kerry was using four letter words before! Actually, to John Kerry, Dean is a four letter word.
[On George W. Bush:] How is it possible that the president is off on vacation and the vice president is, too? Not that it matters that much if the president is on vacation; on some level, the president is always on vacation.
And the president is all wrong when he maintains that a nominee should have an up-or-down vote. The Constitution doesn't say that. The Constitution doesn't say that that nominee shall have any vote at all. There doesn't have to even be a vote.
There's nothing in the Constitution that says the President stops being President in his last year.
Originally, the main purpose of the convention was to determine who the party would have as the presidential nominee and the vice-presidential nominee.
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