With Al Franken Posed To Win, GOP Needs Some Love The U.S. Senate does not have the power to refuse to seat a qualified candidate duly appointed by the sitting governor of a state. While lawyers Akhil Reed Amar and Josh Chafetz argue that the Senate is well within its Constitutional powers, Eugene Volokh and Michael Barone disagree. But the ruling in Adam Clayton Powell v. McCormack is so on point that even Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) was on Meet The Press yesterday obviously backpeddling.
Is African American pol Roland Burris tainted by the accused corruption of Rod Blagojevich. Absolutely! But Democrats dug this hole so now they have to lie in it. Rather than calling a special election that they could possibly lose, their plan is to delay his seating in a hearing long enough for the Illinois legislature to rush through an impeachment and trial to convict Blagojevich and eject him from office. Then the Lieutenant Governor could appoint someone untainted and the Senate could seat that person.
This idiotic move gave Blago an opportunity to take his own party out to the woodshed and show them how to play hardball.
In the Powell case, the Supreme Court clearly established that the only criteria the House could use to refuse to seat a duly elected Representative were the criteria in the Constitution. There's no reason to think that an appointment to the Senate would be substantively or constitutionally different than an election.
Now, Republicans can score on mulitple levels. Aside from galvanizing behind a black man who will be the sole African American in the Senate, they can also magnify the scandal plagued Democratic party that hasn't even began it's legislative term. Roland Burris is vowing to fight
for the seat and has a strong base of support from black ministers.
With Al Franken's surprise win, Norm Coleman looks to be another casualty of the 2008 Obamanation, so the GOP needs something to hang it's hat on and of all people, who would have ever imagined that that gift would come wrapped in the form of a 71-year-old brother from back in the day clinging to his last opportunity to be a player.
With Al Franken's surprise win, Norm Coleman looks to be another casualty of the 2008 Obamanation, so the GOP needs something to hang it's hat on and of all people, who would have ever imagined that that gift would come wrapped in the form of a 71-year-old brother from back in the day clinging to his last opportunity to be a player.