News agencies are reporting that Senator Byrd from West Virginia passed away this morning. He was 92 years old and served the longest term in the Congress in US history.

While he’s often celebrated, his past certainly has some skeletons. For instance, he was formerly a member of the KKK. I heard him speak about that experience once and found his perspective very interesting - how on the one hand he felt empowered by their acceptance of him, but also felt his affiliation with them hindered him on the national stage.

Its been a long time since his KKK days, and while more recently he’s supported Civil Rights laws, in between he’s opposed some other important civil rights laws.

The news is portraying him as a hero to West Virginians for bringing Federal funds to his home state while chairman of the Senate Appropriations committee. Frankly, I’m not so sure that is a good thing - steering funds based on personal ties instead of value and merit sounds almost criminal to me. I wonder if he got any kickbacks?