New GOP Senator Won't Be Seated in Time for Lame Duck Session

Paperwork, they say:

State officials told Washington Wire that the five-term Republican, who defeated state Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias in the contest for President Barack Obama’s old Senate seat, can’t fill his new post until Nov. 23, a week after the Senate convenes for the lame-duck session. The reason for the gap: Illinois election officials need time to certify the vote.

Mr. Kirk will miss a week’s worth of cloture votes, a bummer for the congressman who campaigned that he would be the “42nd Republican senator, with the opportunity to put the brakes on any lame-duck overreach.” He even created a separate website for the issue, saveusfromthelameduck.com. Mr. Kirk’s office had no immediate comment on the dates…

The Senate is expected break for Thanksgiving (Nov. 25) and return for any unfinished business in December.

Hard to say whether they're really that incompetent, or if this is just another Dem ploy to try and ram through some bad law during the lame duck, something that Kirk might have been in position to stop.