Page 13 - Robert Bourque News Today

Elliot richardson did when president nixon ordered him to fire special prosecutor archibald cox. elliot richardson refused the presidents order and resigned. and then the deputy attorney general williams ruckelhaus refused that same order, and then he refused. and then robert bourque obeyed the presidents order. and that was remembered when robert bourque 14 years later was nominated by president reagan to fill a supreme court vacancy and his nomination was defeated by a vote of 58-42. what happ...

The republican anger led to night gingrich house minority cleared and what followed was the win at all costs attitude that we see today. republicans believe democrats are winning at all costs. democrats believe republicans are doing it this way and remember all this happened in 1984. before robert bourque, before clarnls thomas, monica, wmd, you lie, you know, we now know where it all started. does anyone have an idea where it might end? look closely. hidden in every swing, every chip, and every...

Investigationing constitution. the idea you can get bipartisan support, 60 votes in the senate is a vote of confidence youll represent the interests of all americans, not just one particular interest or segment of the population or another. so breaking that 60-vote threshold for the supreme court, the highest court in the land is a big deal and mcconnell has been making it seem like he has no choice in this, but he does have a choice if we look back at some of the fights weve had over nominees i...

Robert bourque lost in committee, but we said he should be allowed to have a vote on the senate floor. he would have been confirmed with the republicans that voted for him. a large number voted against him. at the same time when the republican president was trying to get himo withdraw his name. >> an important addendum there. thanks for teeing up the conversation. there was nothing wrong with that. >> take care. >> still ahead on mtp daily, understanding this word. unmasking and what it really m...

Calling is. comes to the tenth circuit wearing referees jersey, not broncos or packers jersey. hes what we need in a judge. >> he was very impressive and what you need in a justice as well. do you think the fever can break now and after starting with robert bourque to the president its been escalating saying lets get this one passed because theres no reason to vote against him. >> i hope so. its going to depend on democrats. im conservative guy voting record but not partisan. i dont start with r...

The democrats about whether they want to go all out on the gorsuch nomination or recognize that this is so main stream that youre not going to able to block it. >> given your expertise and just your history in the white house, are there any parallels between gorsuch and the robert bourque situation? >> no, i dont think -- robert bourque had much more explosive views, he was much more of a dissenter. he was much more way out of the main stream, his views eventually carried a lot of weight within ...

Presidents nominees, even if hes a fellow kaernt. democrats and the base really want their people to step up to the line and call it what it is. the same way trump was able to sort of like blow away all of this sort of genteel talk, washington talk and be himself and voters really like that. >> i feel like this is, to your earlier point, this is a long-term escalation of sort of the breakdown of decorum in american government, starting with abe fortis in and robert bourque and the heated rhetori...

Level judges. >> put up the senators again. bill nelson is a no. debbie is a no and brown is a no and casey most likely a no and baldwin most likely a no and mccaskill most likely a no. they will not get to 60. they are going down or mcconnell has to go nuclear. >> but there are other senators not on that list from blue states who are principally opposed to filibustering a supreme court nominee, specifically dick durbin who said that. >> just looking at that list, they are not getting to 60. >> ...

Different nominees for the supreme court who were all rejected or forced to withdraw in scandal. but again i think of that as a weird bermuda triangle period in supreme court nominees. there are exceptions. there was that time period. there was the tough time for clarence thomas, robert bourque, those were exceptions but that proved the more general rule. if you get to the point where the president is nominating you to be a supreme court justice and the senate is considering your nomination to b...

The vast majority of those confirmed have been confirmed by a lot, by big overwhelming votes, theres only been a handful of exceptions in modern history. reagan nominee robert bourque was rejected by the senate in 1987. in the george h.w. bush administration, in 1991 clarence thomas was almost rejected by the senate. he squeaked by on a 52-48 vote, the narrowest approval margin for a supreme court justice in modern history. there was also a weird period before that, 1968, 1969, 1970, that was li...