The early debate over the replacement of Sen. Robert C. Byrd has centered on the timetable for Gov. Joe Manchin's announcement and the election that would follow in 2012 (as opposed to this November). While most commentators have dropped the names being knocked around as the obvious choices to fill Byrd's seat, few have analyzed the metrics the governor should use to pick among those he is considering.
The early debate over the replacement of Sen. Robert C. Byrd has centered on the timetable for Gov. Joe Manchin's announcement and the election that would follow in 2012 (as opposed to this November). While most commentators have dropped the names being knocked around as the obvious choices to fill Byrd's seat, few have analyzed the metrics the governor should use to pick among those he is considering.
In fact, it would appear from the press coverage that the governor's only major concerns are:
a) appointing someone who will not challenge him in a special or general election and
b) deciding whether he'd rather run himself at President Obama's midterm or re-election contest. If Gov. Manchin would like to measure his candidates for appointment for U.S. Senate with something more than the yardstick of his own political ambition, I would suggest that he look to the words of Sen. Byrd himself.
In a 2004 Baltimore Sun commentary "Defending Liberty," Byrd took on the George W. Bush White House for sending troops to Iraq. In closing, Byrd wrote: "Each generation of Americans has the responsibility to renew the framer's legacy, and to make this nation shine as a lasting beacon of hope for the world. 'Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.' We must reacquaint ourselves with the Constitution and forge new links with our history. Congress must reinvigorate its defense of the people's liberties. Amid the sound and fury of election-year politics, all of us must take a long, hard look at the kind of country we want to leave to our children."
If, in Byrd's words, Gov. Manchin should concern himself more with defense of the people's liberties and less with his own career options, in the end, such a path might even lead the voters of West Virginia to support him regardless of which year he faced them.
In 1978, Robert Byrd played fiddle on a bluegrass album titled "Mountain Fiddler" with a couple of old boys from the great Country Gentlemen. The album, which featured such bluegrass classics as "Turkey in the Straw" and "Cripple Creek," has been re-released on CD. For anyone under 25, an album was a vinyl disc that allowed your parents to listen to scratchy recordings of music on something other than an iPhone.
The closing song on "Mountain Fiddler," "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," is a song that comforts us in a time of loss by reminding is "there's a better world awaiting, in the sky, Lord, in the sky."
Robinson is author of "Manifest Destiny" and other award-winning political thrillers published by Headline Books in Terra Alta, W.Va.
The early debate over the replacement of Sen. Robert C. Byrd has centered on the timetable for Gov. Joe Manchin's announcement and the election that would follow in 2012 (as opposed to this November). While most commentators have dropped the names being knocked around as the obvious choices to fill Byrd's seat, few have analyzed the metrics the governor should use to pick among those he is considering.
In fact, it would appear from the press coverage that the governor's only major concerns are:
a) appointing someone who will not challenge him in a special or general election and
b) deciding whether he'd rather run himself at President Obama's midterm or re-election contest. If Gov. Manchin would like to measure his candidates for appointment for U.S. Senate with something more than the yardstick of his own political ambition, I would suggest that he look to the words of Sen. Byrd himself.
In a 2004 Baltimore Sun commentary "Defending Liberty," Byrd took on the George W. Bush White House for sending troops to Iraq. In closing, Byrd wrote: "Each generation of Americans has the responsibility to renew the framer's legacy, and to make this nation shine as a lasting beacon of hope for the world. 'Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.' We must reacquaint ourselves with the Constitution and forge new links with our history. Congress must reinvigorate its defense of the people's liberties. Amid the sound and fury of election-year politics, all of us must take a long, hard look at the kind of country we want to leave to our children."
If, in Byrd's words, Gov. Manchin should concern himself more with defense of the people's liberties and less with his own career options, in the end, such a path might even lead the voters of West Virginia to support him regardless of which year he faced them.
In 1978, Robert Byrd played fiddle on a bluegrass album titled "Mountain Fiddler" with a couple of old boys from the great Country Gentlemen. The album, which featured such bluegrass classics as "Turkey in the Straw" and "Cripple Creek," has been re-released on CD. For anyone under 25, an album was a vinyl disc that allowed your parents to listen to scratchy recordings of music on something other than an iPhone.
The closing song on "Mountain Fiddler," "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," is a song that comforts us in a time of loss by reminding is "there's a better world awaiting, in the sky, Lord, in the sky."
Robinson is author of "Manifest Destiny" and other award-winning political thrillers published by Headline Books in Terra Alta, W.Va.
