GOV. Joe Manchin recently announced formation of his Country Roads political action committee and plans to begin soliciting contributions soon - from Democrats, Republicans and "centrists."

"I am going for a centrist group of people who want to bring this country back the middle," he told the Daily Mail's editorial board.

Bully for him. It's high time somebody did.

Somebody's got to save the country, and the clear-thinking and levelheaded Manchin can make a difference.

He wants "balance" - between left and right, between the economy and the environment, and more.

So do most Americans.

West Virginians have long had the reputation of being "yellow-dog Democrats" - meaning they would vote for a yellow dog if he foamed at the mouth at the Labor Day Picnic.

But even yellow dog Democrats are alarmed by the leftist lurch of the party leaders who hold sway in Washington now.

And concern is warranted, because the course party leaders are pursuing would bring the United States to ruin.

So far, the Obama administration and the liberal wing of the Democratic Party have given the American people one enormous bailout after another, wild spending, gynormous debt, and one grandiose scheme after another - first for health care and next for wrenching "climate change" legislation.

Out with coal and reliable coal-fired power. In with wind farms on every ridge.

And what - intermittent power?

It's the progressive wing of the Democratic Party that holds sway in Washington now, and they're practically rabid dogs. 

They don't know much about the nation they would control, display no interest in learning, and have made it plain that they don't care what anybody else thinks.

In fact, they've made it clear that they would destroy anyone who opposes them - even Democrats.

On June 9, The Washington Post reported: "The progressive leaders meeting in Washington this week were savoring the prospect - all but a certainty in their minds - that they would claim their first scalp on Tuesday.

"Speaker after speaker said it wouldn't be the last, declaring that the push to hold centrist Democratic lawmakers accountable to the party's liberal base would continue beyond Arkansas."

One of the intended targets of the "progressive" Democrats gathered in Washington was Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, who faced a runoff against a candidate supported by the "progressive" wing of her party.

Lincoln had committed several political sins. She didn't vote for a government-run health insurance company, or for "card-check" legislation that would have done away with secret ballots in union elections.

That made her, to the progressives, the enemy.

Vowed former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean at the progressives' conclave: "We are going to hold their feet to the fire until they act like real Democrats. Those are our seats, not their seats. They serve at our pleasure . . . . "

Unions alone spent $10 million on the effort to bury Lincoln.

She won the race.

Learning nothing, apparently, "Labor leaders said they would turn their attention to other moderate Democrats," the Post said.

Some "progressive" Democrats don't think even President Obama is enough of a leftist.

Philip Elliott of The Associated Press, again reporting on the progressives' conclave:

"They faulted Obama for the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the slow pace in repealing the ban on gays serving in the military, and last year's economic stimulus package, which they described as inadequate at $787 billion . . . ."

"Activists say they would rather have 'good Democrats' - in the words of Daily Kos founder Markos Moulitsas - than moderates who don't advance a progressive agenda."

So, to "progressives," a "moderate Democrat" is not a "good Democrat" or a "real Democrat."

Vast swaths of the nation disagree.

To many West Virginia Democrats, the people who rule Washington today are economically ignorant, reckless, controlling nut cases.

To many Americans, a "progressive" is someone who intends to take progressively more of your money and give it to somebody else.

A "progressive" is someone who would abolish coal mining, put tens of thousands of people out of work to save a mayfly, and put windmills on every hilltop so we could have the power reliability that Third World countries enjoy.

What's progressive about that?

Nothing.

It's time for Americans in both parties to assert themselves.

The Democratic Party is on the wrong course. The nation is on the wrong course.

Here's to those, like Manchin, who lead the race to the sensible center.

Maurice is editorial page

editor of the Daily Mail. She may be reached at 348-4802 or ha...@dailymail.com.