West Virginia Blue
The Best Blogging Community in West Virginia Democratic politics, progressive policies, the good life and free living in Wild, Wonderful West Virginia.
Critics have complained that the Senator's staff has been tight-lipped about his condition including keeping the hospital where he's being treated a secret.
During a visit to Wheeling Tuesday, Manchin said the Senator should be left in peace as he recovers from a staph infection.
"I hope that he's able to recover as quickly as possible and get back but I don't think that anyone should be pushing or making him get back quicker than his health will allow him," said Manchin.
BYRD STAFF ON FACT-FINDING
MOUNTAIN-TOP MINING TOUR
Senator Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) today announced that several staff members from
his Charleston and Washington, DC offices are on a three-day fact-finding tour of
portions of West Virginia to view first-hand mountain-top mining operations.
Byrd's statement follows:
"During the next few days, several members of my Senate staff from both my
Charleston and Washington offices will be touring portions of West Virginia to view
first-hand mountain-top mining operations. These staffers, while engaged in their
fact-finding mission, will also be meeting with coal industry representatives, as
well as members of the environmental community and other concerned citizens. During
their visit, they are also expected to evaluate the on-going flood recovery efforts,
and discuss concerns expressed to my office about the impact of mountain-top mining
and the severity of damage from the recent floods."
"While I am personally unable to participate in this tour at the present time, I
have instructed these staff members to be my eyes and ears on the ground and report
back their findings and the results of their discussions in an effort for me to
obtain the most up-to-date information on the issue of mountain-top mining. With
the recent announcement from the Obama Administration that it is planning to
increase federal oversight of the mining operations, I believe it is imperative for
my staff and me to hear from all interested parties in West Virginia as we move
forward on this debate."
Excellent news. It's important that our politicians and their staffs see the devastation and the danger from MTR for themselves.
Meanwhile, USA Today describes Byrd passing on work to his longtime friend and colleague as he continues to recover from his recent illness.
Byrd, who chairs the homeland security panel of the Senate Appropriations Committee, asked Sen. Daniel Inouye of Hawaii to lead the fiscal 2010 homeland security appropriations bill during markup this week, his office said today. The current bill increases homeland security funding 7% from last year, according to Byrd's office.
"The need to move forward with this bill is critical. ... It is imperative that Congress provide the resources necessary to protect our nation's homeland," the Democrat, who is the longest-serving senator in history, said in a statement.
U.S. Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., is recovering nicely from a recent staph infection and is feeling fit enough to begin physical therapy, his office said.
Byrd's good medical report is good news for his Senate colleagues, who need every vote possible to pass healthcare and energy reforms this session, Politico reported Tuesday.
Politico, meanwhile, goes with its usual Republican spin, As Robert Byrd improves, Democrats fret, except no where in Politico's own story does it show any Democrats fretting.
In President Obama's inaugural address, he declared that "we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our founding fathers, faced with perils that we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake."
The President's statement referenced false and disingenuous choices of the Bush Administration. As the facts continue to come to light about exactly what happened at Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, Bagram, and other U.S.-run secret prisons around the world, it is increasingly impossible to ignore that the U.S. government violated the basic human rights of prisoners. Not only did these insidious tactics sacrifice our national integrity, but they may also have compromised our security as well.
The recently leaked report from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), as well as the four released memorandums from the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), confirm our worst fears. These documents point to brutal, inhumane acts which were repeatedly carried out by U.S. military personnel, and which were authorized and condoned at the highest levels of the Bush Administration. These acts appear to directly violate both the U.N. Convention Against Torture and the Geneva Conventions. Spain and the United Kingdom have already initiated investigations of Bush Administration officials who approved these acts. The United States needs to investigate as well. To continue to ignore the mounting evidence of clear wrongdoing is a national humiliation.
snip
The rule of law is not just a lofty concept to which we should aspire only when convenient. It is a fundamental principal upon which our Republic was founded, and it is the foundation of our free society. I understand the desire to look forward and to forge a new path on high ground instead of on the low road of the past eight years. But to use the need to move on as a reason not to investigate basic human rights violations is unacceptable. Excusing individuals at the highest levels of government from adhering to the rule of law, whether in wartime or not, is a dangerous precedent, for it undercuts the principle of accountability which permeates representative democracy.
Sadly, the world will discover more and more about the acts committed at Guantanamo Bay, Bagram, and elsewhere around the world. There is no avoiding that eventuality. It is our choice as a nation whether to pursue the path of truth ourselves, or leave the details of the abuse to be painfully revealed by others. Releasing the OLC memos was a courageous and admirable first step. But we must not stop there.
I write you today as a grandfather, and as a deep admirer of your inimitable contribution to our beloved state of West Virginia. As the son of a coal miner, I will always value your work to ensure economic investment and proper safety in our coalfields.
Soon, as you know, as the colorful peepers of red bush and wake robins pull from the clinch of winter, I will take my granddaughter's hand and roam our Clay Branch hollows in search of ramps. This has been a 150-year tradition in my family in the Coal River mountain range, as I am sure it was for your family along Wolf Creek.
This year, though, instead of that pungent smell of wild ramps and the blossoms of spring, my granddaughter will be exposed to the sickening haze of ammonium nitrate and diesel oil, and the after shower of silica dust that blankets our hollow like a plague. Our ancestral mountain in the Peachtree community is being destroyed for a mountaintop removal operation.
In your wonderful book last year, Letter to a New President: Commonsense Lessons for Our Next Leader, you wrote that we should never turn our backs on the lessons of our coal-mining fathers. My father, like others in my family, first started working in the mines at age 11. But it is the grave of my Uncle Clyde Williams, who died in the mine at Leevale here on Coal River Mountain at age 17, that also hovers in my mind as I walk these hills, gather herbs and berries, and hunt and fish with my grandchildren.
I want my children and grandchildren to have the right to dream and flourish as great contributors to our state in West Virginia. I don't want them to feel compelled to leave our state to look for employment or to realize their dreams. I want them to know that the rule of law protects them, their families and our mountains.
You, more than any other person in our state, understand this. When you went to Washington, D.C., for the first time to represent West Virginia, more than 130,000 union coal miners proudly toted their lunch pails and went to their jobs in the underground mines in our state. And you, as our voice in Washington, proudly made sure their safety and security were priorities to the rest of the country. Today, only 20,000 West Virginia coal miners make up those ranks. In many respects, strip mining and mountaintop removal operations have robbed my generation and my children of a chance to maintain our great Appalachian heritage, our beloved mountains and vibrant streams, and above all, any diverse economic development in our community.
In responding to the recent EPA decision to scrutinize mountaintop removal permits more closely last week, you wrote: "Every job in West Virginia matters. Everyone involved must act swiftly in concert and cooperation to remedy any problems that threaten coal jobs and the people who live in the local communities where coal is mined."
Sen. Byrd, as a grandfather, I write to you: If our grandchildren are going to have any jobs and future at all in West Virginia, we must get beyond the stranglehold of mountaintop removal coal operations and find a way to bring new jobs and life to our mountain communities.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., announced Thursday that West Virginia will receive more than $6.6 million in federal funds as part of the recently passed economic stimulus bill.
Charleston will receive $497,051 of that money for local projects.
The money will be administered through the Community Development Block Grant Formula Program. It will allow the state and local governments to fund community projects for low and moderate-income people.
"These monies being made directly to our local communities will help improve the standard of living for the West Virginians who need it most," Byrd said.
These funds are being administered through Community Development Block Grants so there is already oversight in place on how they're used.
The Martinsburg Journal's Naomi Smoot has a good story on Sen. Robert C. Byrd:
They don't call him "Big Daddy" for nothing.
In recent years, U.S. Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., has secured more than $400 million for projects in the Eastern Panhandle, not to mention what he's done for the rest of the state.
As the former chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Byrd helped obtain nearly $150 million in funding for upgrades along W.Va. 9. The senator has also secured nearly $244 million thus far for the Air National Guard's C-5 Galaxy aircraft conversion project at the Eastern West Virginia Regional Airport.
And then there are the jobs - thousands of jobs.
"Sen. Byrd has had much success in convincing government officials that West Virginia is an ideal location for many federal agency operations," staff members said in a recent news release.
I wanted to watch President-elect Obama first news conference. The crawler on CNN had the news of Sen. Robert Byrd voluntarily giving up his chairmanship of the powerful Appropriations Committee.
"To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven," said Byrd, who had fended off earlier challenges this past spring and summer. "Those Biblical words from Ecclesiastes 3:1 express my feelings about this particular time in my life."
::::::::
"To be serving in the Senate at such a momentous time in our history fills me with enormous pride," Byrd said. "I endorsed President-elect Obama because I believed that we had taken the wrong course both at home and abroad. I am delighted with his victory. I was an early critic of the war in Iraq, as was the president-elect, who decried this war even before he was running for a United States Senate seat. I wish our new president every success with his commitment to unite us as one people."
As president pro tempore of the Senate Sen. Byrd would remain behind Speaker Pelosi in the line of sucession.
Then there was the news about Leader Reid's meeting with Sen. Joe LIEberSchmuck. "I'll take a few days", said Joe from the Party of One. Well, Colin McEnroe at the Harford Courant has One thing to ponder...
Lieberman, who has broken violently with his party and engaged in campaigning loathsome fear-mongering against the man he once begged to come and save him, holds a prestigious committee chairmanship.
Hillary Clinton, at the moment, has no chairmanship at all because of the seniority system.
Close race in Minnesota. Funny numbers in the Alaska Senate race. Georgia headed to a runoff. (remember Sen. Cleland at the EP JJ last year?)
Seems like every other month, either the Washington Post or Politico reports moves to remove Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-Beloved) from chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee.
Politico reported it again earlier today. After so many false reports on the topic, I'll believe it when I see it.
"I learned a long time ago you can't believe everything you read in the papers, especially here in Washington," Senator Robert Byrd said. "I am totally focused on electing Barack Obama as President and Anne Barth as Congresswoman in next week's elections. And in my capacity as Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, I continue to craft a potential second stimulus package that will benefit Main Street America."
Personally I'd rather see Byrd remain chairman of Appropriations than Sen. Harry Reid remain as Senate Majority Leader. Reid's not done a good of job as many of us has hoped. He's allowed the Republicans to roadblock Democrats' bills yet yields constantly to the Republicans. Reid's the one who needs replaced.
With only 13 days to go until Election Day, I wanted to impress upon you just how important your vote is. In over five decades of public service to my fellow West Virginians, I believe this election is the most important one we've ever faced together. America has gotten way, way off track and it will require skilled leadership, experience and political courage to guide us back to peace and prosperity in the coming years.
That is why I want to let you know just how very, very important I believe it is to send Anne Barth to Congress. As a senior aide and State Director in my Charleston office, Anne has 21 years of on-the-job experience working alongside me, as my eyes and ears on the ground, to get things done in Washington for the people of West Virginia.
And I can tell you first-hand that she has been working extremely hard during this election. As a minister's daughter, she was raised in a tradition of service to others, and she brings that same energy in a tradition of service to others, and she brings that same energy and desire to be helpful in everything she does.
Anne knows that invading and occupying Iraq was a mistake, and that the $12 billion per month we are spending there means that many of our own needs here at home are going unmet. Anne knows that working families in West Virginia have been getting the short end of the stick for 8 long years. Anne knows that clean coal technologies have a central role to play in a new national energy policy. Anne understands that the working middle class is the real economic engine of America - not the fat cats on Wall Street.
Anne Barth understands that it takes political courage to be a real leader - and I can bear witness that she is ready to lead.
West Virginia's 2nd congressional district is one of the largest geographically in America. Campaigning from Point Pleasant on the Ohio River to Harpers Ferry at the confluence of the Potomac and Shenandoah Rivers is quite a logistical challenge, but Anne has been tireless and has proven she is more than up to the task. She shares with me a genuine love for one-on-one politics, and has enjoyed meeting thousands of voters across the Mountain State face to face.
And I am enjoying being part of Anne Barth's campaign. She is intelligent, diligent and -- since I've been in a campaign or two myself - seems always willing to listen to my advice.
I have a lot of faith in Anne Barth, and I also have a lot of faith in the people of West Virginia. I know they'll look closely at Anne's candidacy and make the right decision on November 4th. At this very critical juncture 2 weeks out from Election Day, I am urging you to please make a contribution to the Anne Barth for Congress campaign. I would consider it a smart investment in the future of West Virginia.
Thank you!!
Your Friend,
Senator Robert C. Byrd to Receive Dr. Perry F. Harris Distinguished Fiddler Award
Nashville, Tenn.... Senator Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia will receive the Dr. Perry F. Harris Distinguished Fiddler Award at the Grand Ole Opry on Saturday, October 4, 2008, at 7:00 p.m. in Nashville, Tenn. Byrd, who is a lifelong fiddler, will be honored for his contribution to the world of fiddling and fiddle music.
A tribute to Senator Byrd's efforts to promote and publicize fiddling throughout his career, will be held during the Grand Master Fiddler Championship at 2:15 p.m. on Saturday, October 4, 2008, inside the Nashville Convention Center. The program will feature information about Senator Byrd's fiddling career as well as showcase musicians playing some of the Senator's favorite fiddle tunes.
"I thank the Grand Master Fiddler Championship for honoring me with this prestigious award. As a young boy in West Virginia who loved to fiddle, I never dreamed that my life would be so blessed and enriched by that beautiful instrument. I am humbled by this honor and think of my late wife Erma who always encouraged me practice and perform fiddle music," said Senator Robert C. Byrd.
Senator Byrd learned to play the fiddle when he was a teenager and carried the instrument with him everywhere he went. While living in Southern West Virginia, Senator Byrd played in churches, homes, and later Senator Byrd won the hearts of voters when he performed fiddle music on the campaign trail.
Senator Byrd's expert fiddling skills and passion for fiddle music led to performances at the Kennedy Center, the Grand Ole Opry, and on the television show, Hee Haw. While Senator Byrd was serving as the U.S. Senate Majority Leader in 1978, he recorded an album called "Mountain Fiddler".
For more information on the Dr. Perry F. Harris Distinguished Fiddler Award and schedule of events, please refer to here.
U.S. Senator Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., presents a copy of his latest book, "Letter to a New President: Commonsense Lessons for Our Next Leader", to U.S. Senator and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, D-Ill., on Wednesday, October 1, 2008, in Washington, D.C.
Someone had to stay home and watch the U.S. Senate in Washington, D.C., to stop George W. Bush's shenanigans. From Jake Stump at the Daily Mail:
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- The reason U.S. Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., isn't at the Democratic National Convention this week is because of his duties at the Senate, according to his office.
Since Byrd serves as president pro tempore of the Senate, he is taking turns in Washington gaveling the Senate into and out of session.
That practice has become common in order to keep President Bush from making recess appointments.
Copyright 2011 West Virginia Blue
Site content may be used for any purpose without explicit permission unless otherwise specified.
This site exists thanks to financial support from BlogPAC, dedicated volunteers and participation by members of this community. The views expressed at West Virginia Blue belong solely to their respective authors.
