I will read what I want and paste what I want. You don't present a whole lot except Wrong Wrong Wrong, Are you the Tom Daschle of Mudville?

In the early 1940s, when Byrd was approximately 24 years old, he joined the Ku Klux Klan, which he had seen holding parades in Matoaka, West Virginia, as a child, his father having also been a Klan member[4]. Byrd was unanimously elected as the Exalted Cyclops of his local chapter. [5] Byrd, in his autobiography, attributed the beginnings of his political career to this incident, though he lamented that they involved the Klan. According to Byrd's recollection, Baskin told him, "You have a talent for leadership, Bob... The country needs young men like you in the leadership of the nation." Byrd recalls that "suddenly lights flashed in my mind! Someone important had recognized my abilities. I was only 23 or 24, and the thought of a political career had never struck me. But strike me that night, it did." The KKK was seen as a stepping stone for aspiring southern politicians — one of the reasons attributed to Byrd's membership.