"Mr Burris, party of one, your seat is ready..."

What in the hell are Democrats thinking?!?

They put on one theatrical showing at the Capitol by denying Burris the Illinois seat -- and then the next DAY they say now they're going to seat him. The overreaching argument made by Diane Feinstein is nothing short of laughable. Believing that the Burris situation would underscore every other gubernatorial appointment is incredibly out of the context of the charges and possible impeachment facing Blagojevich and the "highest bidder" scheme he allegedly was focused on. Diane -- to the best of my knowledge, no other governor is under such scrutiny linked to a Senate seat -- so your argument falls flatly in the face of reason.

This is crazy!!

Admittedly - I haven't done my homework on Mr. Burris' background, but from my twitter friend @verucablue's impressionable statement Roland simply isn't fit the bill and doesn't sound like the best person for the vacant Senate seat. So I had to ask "why him?" and the answer came back to me lightning fast: because no one else wanted a tainted seat like this.

It's the equivalent of playing political Russian Roulette -- because the likelihood of Blagojevich being removed from office is incredibly great. Thus anyone who accepted the appointment is also going to be tainted.

The defense of Mr. Burris relies in the "letter of the law" which is accurate. There are no current mechanisms to deny the likes of Blagojevich (or any other governor by the sounds of it) to appoint someone while under criminal investigation for selling a U.S. Senate seat. The "letter of the law" doesn't have any immediate remedy to stop Blagojevich from appointing anyone he saw fit. The only remedy would be weeks or months away as the Illinois state house and senate are proceeding with their impeachment proceedings for the embattled governor.

It's a gaping hole in the Illinois Constitution that I suspect will be remedied at some point in the coming year. Because if there's no mechanism in place to stop a Governor from invoking some very wild ideas while looking at his political death-clock.

I do believe that Blagojevich will be removed from office and any recognizable form of his political career will effectively be over ... but the repercussions of his actions will remain in place. If in fact Mr. Burris was pulled from the mid-to-lower deck of qualified applicants to serve the people of Illinois -- then it's the people of Illinois who have every reason to be upset.

The issue isn't about race, but whether or not the best qualified person is in the position to do the best possible job for the people of Illinois. It's a stain that will remain on him for the rest of his political career. Mr. Burris doesn't seem like the best option for Illinois as much as he was possibly their only option with the tainted mess Blagojevich has made here.