Political Quotes

“Mr. President, it is rare that I disagree with the Senator from Texas--maybe once or twice in the last half a dozen years. Seriously, we disagree from time to time, but we do it in a way that we are not disagreeable with one another. I support the President's nomination of Chuck Hagel to be our Secretary of Defense, and I wish to take a couple of minutes to explain why. For folks who might be watching this from afar, this body used to operate very differently than it does today. The President would nominate people to serve in a cabinet or to serve as judges and there would be hearings. There would be debate. Sometimes people would disagree. But, certainly, for Cabinet appointments and for sub-Cabinet level appointments, for the most part, the President got the team he, or someday she, asked for. That is the way we have done it as Governors across the country, and it is the way we still do it. The idea of 4 years of this administration to still be playing a game of executive branch Swiss cheese--we have so many relatively high level positions, confirmable positions that are still vacant--is not good, whether it happens to be a Democratic administration or a Republican administration. The President, regardless of what party they are from, needs, for the most part, to have the team they want to put in place. They have been elected to lead. Let's give them a chance to lead. If they screw up, we can hold them accountable.…”