Seems the Republicans in Congress just love to scream how we all need to obey the Constitution, but when it comes to applying that same logic to matters they disagree with, they suddenly get amnesia and retreat into their anti-Obama talking points.
The perfect example of that was on display earlier this morning on MSNBC when host Tamron Hall interviewed the always ignorant Congressman Steve King, who has made a career of spreading lies, hatred, and xenophobia about anyone who doesn’t look like him.
Discussing the vacancy on the Supreme Court after the death of Antonin Scalia, Hall told the Congressman that the current Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Chuck Grassley, had said during the last months of George W. Bush’s term in office:
“The Senate has never stopped confirming judicial nominees during the last few months of a president’s term.”
King, trying his best to make gold out of dung, replied:
“You’ll find Chuck Schumer in his own words, and others also that contradict themselves, and you’re going to see, if people have been in that senate long enough, that they have been on the opposite side of this equation, there will be arguments that are made on both sides of this. But if I heard Chuck Grassley’s words right, he said judicial nominees, he didn’t say Supreme Court justices.”
At that point, Hall took Congressman King to school and reminded him:
“And others would say please see the words correctly in the Constitution, it clearly states the role of the President, and that of the Senate.”
Yes, Congressman King, let’s look at the relevant section of the Constitution:
“[The President] shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two-thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law: but the Congress may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments.
The President shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may happen during the recess of the Senate, by granting commissions which shall expire at the end of their next session.”
So, Congressman King, it looks like you need to get go back to civics class and get a freaking clue.