Senator Robert Byrd---A Remembrance

There are only a few people who can be leading statespeople (note the political correctness in that word) and also record some brilliant music and all the while still be taken seriously as leading political lights.  Robert Byrd was such a person.

TRADITIONS was on yesterday and had the Senator passed on prior to the program rest assured what you will see below would have been included.  Happily he lived longer than the time that is allotted to the program.

No sense to go into his many accomplishments, his strength of character, his ability to change, and more here since you have probably heard them many times on NPR and the like today.  Briefly--


Raised by and uncle and aunt and dirt poor (his mother died before he was 1), joined the KKK later, apologized later, served in the Statehouse of his state then on to Congress---and now dying as the longest serving Senator.  A Senator who truly embodied the tradition of what the Senate was and should be.  He carried with him a copy of the Constitution and was proud to talk of the equality of the 3 branches of government---and never as strongly as when he chastised the Bush Administration for riding roughshod over the Constitution and the equality of the 3 branches.  He was also one of the rare politicians (statespeople) who was willing to apoligize for mistakes made----KKK,  his vote for Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, and was also willing to name the names in the Bush administration that he felt have usurped the Constitution.  

If you read, a while back, the novel Advise and Consent he was not the Southern senator depicted there.  Truly a man open to change and to honesty---and, finally, we get to what this is about since you can read and hear about Sen. Byrd on radio, TV, and forthcoming books (for sure).  He was a talented musician.

We have Ralph Stanley, The Osbornes, Bill Monroe---but there is also a wonderful practitioner of the form---Sen. Byrd.  In fact, at many of his rallys he performed and was known to say that people of his W Virginia area believe in 2 things---well, maybe a few more but this is a praphrase---God and Robert Byrd. So as to his music---time to see a video of some music he made on a recording issued by County Records---honesty now---what is not on YouTube these days---but the good part is it preserves our history so well.



To be able to be talented in this area and have it respected by his peers and still be a leading and, frankly, honest light in the Senate the Shakespeare comment comes back to us once again---"....when shall we ever see his like again".