What will Harry Reid do now?

Apparently, Rod Blagojevich plans to nominate former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris to fill Obama's Senate seat. Will Reid carry through on his vow, signed by 50 Senate Democrats, to refuse to seat anyone nominated by Blagojevich when the nominee is a black man?

As Jim Geraghty points out, Illinois is already planning to have a special election to fill Rahm Emanuel's congressional seat as well as municipal elections in February and April.

Now that the Governor has trumped the Illinois legislature by making his own nomination before they could either impeach him or vote to hold a special election, we're now faced with the ludicrous situation of having Senate Democrats decide if they want to seat a guy they probably would have been perfectly fine with seating before the scandal broke.

For Republicans, it's pass the popcorn time.

UPDATE: Harry Reid seems to be hanging tough though Eugene Volokh casts doubt on the Senate's power to reject a candidate who is otherwise eligible due to the 1969 Supreme Court case, Powell v. McCormack. Next week, my government classes are starting the unit on Congress. I used to teach the Powell case, but dropped it this year because I was trying to narrow down the number of cases that the kids have to learn and the issue doesn't come up that much. I guess I might have to add it back in this year.