The death last evening of Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia is a turning point in the Senate. Byrd is the last of the old line southern Democrats. He fought against the Civil Rights act in 1964 and was actually a leader of the Ku Klux Klan in his earlier days. Many people today do not even know that the opposition to the civil rights movement came from Democrats, not Republicans.
With Byrd gone, it will be interesting to see who gets appointed to replace him. West Virginia has a Democrat governor, so there should be no party change. It may take a while until the new senator is sworn in,however; so there will be one less vote in the waning days of this session for Obama's programs. In fact, there may now not be enough votes in the senate to pass the conference committee's bill on financial reform.
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