Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim in CT
McConnell followed the Biden Rule to a t. he did precisely what Biden suggested should be done if a president tried making a late term appointment. but you didn’t care when biden suggested it, did you? hmmm?
how many times do you have to step on a rake and take it in the face like a Hanna Barbera cartoon character, before you learn to watch your step?
Posted from my iPhone/Mobile device
|
Once again you prove that you only listen to rhetoric and ignore facts.
Biden's floor speech was on June 25, 1992, more than three months later in the election cycle than McConnell's.
There was no Supreme Court vacancy to fill.
There was no nominee to consider.
The Senate never took a vote to adopt a rule to delay consideration of a nominee until after the election.
Nonetheless, Biden took to the floor in a speech addressing the Senate president to urge delay if a vacancy did appear. But he didn't argue for a delay until the next president began his term, as McConnell is doing. He said the nomination process should be put off until after the election, which was on Nov. 3, 1992.
Many of Biden's words echo the state of Washington today:
"Given the unusual rancor that prevailed in the (Clarence) Thomas nomination, the need for some serious reevaluation of the nomination and confirmation process, and the overall level of bitterness that sadly infects our political system and this presidential campaign already, it is my view that the prospects for anything but conflagration with respect to a Supreme Court nomination this year are remote at best."
He noted that among the previous seven nominations, two were not confirmed and two passed with strong opposition.
"In my view, politics has played far too large a role in the Reagan-Bush nominations to date. One can only imagine that role becoming overarching if a choice were made this year, assuming a justice announced tomorrow that he or she was stepping down.
"Should a justice resign this summer and the president move to name a successor, actions that will occur just days before the Democratic Presidential Convention and weeks before the Republican Convention meets, a process that is already in doubt in the minds of many will become distrusted by all. Senate consideration of a nominee under these circumstances is not fair to the president, to the nominee, or to the Senate itself.