Just seat Burris, already

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I believe that Harry Reid will be making a stupid and avoidable error if he refuses to seat former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris in the U.S. Senate Tuesday. There are two problems:

1. Burris is the official appointee to Obama's vacant Senate seat as selected by the duly elected Governor of Illinois. The U.S. Senate does not have the power to usurp the executive authority of a state governor irrespective of how crooked or insane he is accused of being. Rod Blagojevich has not been impeached, indicted, or convicted.

2. By pulling a stunt like barring Burris from the Senate, Reid and his Democratic supporters forfeit any moral high ground they may have in the face of Republican efforts to block Al Franken from taking his seat.

3. Burris is famous in Illinois only for having been the state's first African American Attorney General and for not having been accused of political corruption. But as a U.S. Senate candidate in 2010, first in a Democratic primary election, Burris will have his tailbone handed to him by current Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan or just about anyone else with statewide name recognition this side of Lieutenant Governor and professional bozo Pat Quinn. No one in the Illinois Democratic Party is interested in sending a 70-year-old freshman to the Senate who will achieve meaningful seniority for the state about the time his last artery hardens, so that makes Burris an excellent 2-year caretaker for the seat.

So just seat Burris, already. It's not up to the Senate President to choose between tainted and untainted Senators when allocating the deck chairs. Burris would be harmless to the Democrats during a short term in the Senate. He would be totally out of his league as a Senate freshman, and therefore totally dependent on direction from senior Senator Dick Durbin, not to mention Rahm Emanuel and President Obama. Therefore, Burris presents no significant political problem either for the statewide Democratic Party or for the Obama administration. The voters of Illinois can purge the taint themselves, so to speak, in the senatorial elections of 2010.

Unfortunately for Burris on a personal level, he sort of doofed into this appointment, and he hasn't handled it with the acumen or grace of a real professional. Burris could have capped off his career with a noble gesture of public service by declaring that he'd accept the Blagojevich appointment reluctantly, and only to ensure that Illinois has full representation in the U.S. Senate during this difficult time; and that he would not seek permanent election to the post in 2010. Opportunity: blown. Advantage: taint. Oh: well.

Meanwhile, could we have DHS check the Senate plumbing system to determine whether someone is putting stupid pills into Harry Reid's water cooler?