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WV-Sen: Goodwin's Law

by: Crisitunity

Fri Jul 16, 2010 at 10:59 AM EDT


There won't be an official announcement until later this afternoon, but the name of the temporarily appointed Senator from West Virginia has been leaked to the AP:

Gov. Joe Manchin is tapping his former chief counsel and a member of a prominent West Virginia family, Carte Goodwin, to succeed the late U.S. Sen. Robert C. Byrd, Democratic officials told The Associated Press on Friday.

Three officials familiar with the governor's pick spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment ahead of an official announcement.

So, instead of appointing an elder-statesman like Gaston Caperton to fill Robert Byrd's seat, Manchin decided to take a page from Charlie Crist and reward one of his right-hand-men with a temporary Senate seat... and in doing so, build the statewide bench by getting a young up-and-comer onto the electoral map for a possible future run for something. One thing I hadn't known about Goodwin until today is that he's only 36, which will make him the youngest current Senator. Goodwin's from a locally well-connected family, too; his father was chair of the West Virginia University's Board of Governors, his uncle is a federal judge in West Virginia, and his cousin is a US Attorney in West Virginia -- so we can probably expect to hear more from him in the future after his half-year of service is over.
Crisitunity :: WV-Sen: Goodwin's Law
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WV-Sen: Goodwin's Law | 40 comments
Not
a bad choice at all. The point of a seat warmer is to be invisible and vote for legislation without question. Goodwin fits that and I could see him in politics in the future as well. The states AG is 74 so will probably not run for re-election in 2012, Goodwin could run for that or possibly Congress in 2012. I like Barth, do not get me wrong but it's manchin's choice and not a bad one. I would not have been upset if he appointed Caperton but the one concern about that is he currently lives in New York and that might not go over great, it probably would not have hurt that much but still any controversy that can be avoided should. Also I posted this earlier: I should point out that I am straight but I think we have a contender for hottest Senator (We once had a very long open thread discussion of the hottest people in Washington).

http://blogs.wvgazette.com/squ...


Proud member of the Indiana Democratic Party from IN-9.  

Hottest Or Not
He's a great pick (and off-hand I can't think of any hotter one). Barth would've been good too, but he's very talented, and this will set him up nicely for a future run. I think he'd like to be AG, but there's about to be a ton of turnover at the top ranks of WV's elected officials so it's hard to predict exactly where he'll end up at this point.  
[ Parent ]
Yes
it is a very good decision on Manchins part. Although I wonder how West Virginia will react to having someone that is, gasp, young.  

Proud member of the Indiana Democratic Party from IN-9.  
[ Parent ]
Wrong Link
http://blogs.wvgazette.com/squ...

Proud member of the Indiana Democratic Party from IN-9.  
[ Parent ]
I just googled him and I found this picture which is even better
http://www.wvrecord.com/conten...

Seriously, I'd form a joint subcommittee with him any day.

[ Parent ]
That's Jonathan Deem, Not Carte Goodwin
Deem is Gov. Manchin's current counsel, Carte's successor.
[ Parent ]
anyone else wanna wonder how long
until rumors start that manchin's secretly gay and sleeping with all these attractive (to you guys, i'm a 17 year old straight male) men who "counsel" him

18, Dem, CA-14 (home) CA-09 (college, next year). social libertarian, economic liberal, fiscal conservative.   Everybody should put age and CD here. :)
[ Parent ]
Yeah
I was actually thinking that but did not want to say anything. Perhaps he is sick of all of the very old politicians in the state and it makes him feel better to have some young blood around. That is what I what I am telling myself anyway.  

Proud member of the Indiana Democratic Party from IN-9.  
[ Parent ]
You're Thinking About the Wrong Governor
If you are in the mood to rumor-monger. Goodwin and Deem happen to be very talented young attorneys who are also good-looking (that photo actually doesn't do Deem justice). But there are no such rumors about any of these men. Now there was a recent WV governor that was the subject of such rumors - but that too might've simply been people wondering stuff like this.
[ Parent ]
Nah
I was not being serious, although do tell about the Guv who was subject to these rumors.  

Proud member of the Indiana Democratic Party from IN-9.  
[ Parent ]
Well, either way, he knows how to pick them.

[ Parent ]
Interesting trivia
Beginning with Michael Bennet, each appointed Senator has been younger than the last, and has been for a brief period the youngest currently serving senator.

Male, 23, DC-At Large
Does he drive a pickup?
Just kidding. Let's hope he's more loyal than Crist's pick (Lemeiux).
In Lemeiux's defense
Crist was the un loyal one for jumping ship.
[ Parent ]
and
his wife ran Jay Rockefeller's Charleston office too.
Weak placeholders are source of troubles.

I dislike appointments like this.
Honestly
the more I read about Goodwin the more happy I am. He does not seem weak at all, I read the profile someone posted of him above you and he seems perfect, a young dad who is smart attractive and a possible candidate for future political office in a state were everyone is so freaking old. Seat Warmers are not supposed to draw a lot of attention, he just needed to appoint someone that would go and vote for Democratic legislation without question, this means millions of Americans will get there much needed unemployment. I like Barth but this works to and I am glad he finally appointed someone.  

Proud member of the Indiana Democratic Party from IN-9.  
[ Parent ]
which have been problematic?
Certainly not Kaufman or, despite my fears, Burris.
[ Parent ]
In a way both of them were
If John Carney and Lisa Madigan had been appointed instead, we'd be holding those seats easily rather than possibly losing them.
[ Parent ]
Maybe Not DE
The thing about DE is, Beau Biden was supposed to run (but we didn't want to just anoint him), and Mike Castle was supposed to ride off into the sunset. That those things wouldn't happen was actually pretty hard to see in December 2008. And, of course, policy-wise, Kaufman's been great.

In IL though, you're right, mostly. If Madigan were RUNNING, we'd be fine. If she'd taken an appointment from Blago, though, I think that would've really damaged her.

[ Parent ]
Castle wouldn't run against Carney
They're pretty close. Kaufman's appointment forced Carney into the House race, which forced Castle into the Senate race.

[ Parent ]
How?
How did it "force" Carney into the House race? Everyone knew Kaufman was only a place-holder, it didn't give him a leg-up on a race he wasn't entering. And I'm not sure I buy that Castle and Carney are that close, since Carney seems to have been willing to run against Castle. Maybe Castle's afraid of Carney, but hell, Carney could've moved over to the Senate race after Biden passed, or even when we started hearing about Biden's ambivalence.
[ Parent ]
Of course it forced him to the house
When the entire power structure of the state and the VPOTUS and POTUS set up the coronation of a Prince, you don't rock the apple cart and expect to have a long career.

Castle wouldn't have run against a sitting Senator that hadn't done anything stupid.  In fact, I'd bet the farm he would have retired this cycle, and we'd have Carney as Senator and Coons as Congressmember.

[ Parent ]
Castle was already in the race at that point
If Carney had just run for Senate in the first place, Castle probably wouldnt have it seems.

DE was a god damn cluster fuck and the Bidens really screwed us here.

[ Parent ]
Uh Andy
Beau screwed us, not his dad and the rest of his family. This whole thing with appointing Kaufman to the seat was to clear the way for Beau to run. When he got cold feet and said no, he screwed us all, not his dad the Veep.

22, Male, Democrat, PA-18.
[ Parent ]
It would not be the first time that a son
did not follow the path set out for him by his father.

I wonder if Joe even asked Beau.

[ Parent ]
Uh no
Beau didn't have the power to arrange this idiocy.  The responsibility here is 99% on Joe Biden.

I suppose you could even make the case it was his genes that made Beau wimp out.

[ Parent ]
Biden
arranged for Kauffman's appointment so Beau could run this year.  
[ Parent ]
NewMex answer your very well

The troubles in Delaware are obvious, the Democratic Party is in high risk of lose the seat.

That mean not Kaufman is a bad man or a bad senator.

[ Parent ]
Of course not
Ted Kaufman has been quite impressive actually, especially coming from a pro-bank state.
[ Parent ]
That's because
he's the first Senator from DE in a long time who hasn't had to kowtow to the banks.  What are they going to do to him, refuse to support Coons?  They're already doing that.  For comparison, look at how liberal Joe Biden's become now that he doesn't have to play to the home-state banks.  The thought that that Joe Biden was always in there, held prisoner by the banks' stranglehold on his state, is pretty sad.

The Crolian Progressive: as great an adventure as ever I heard of...
[ Parent ]
Kaufman
doesn't have to run for reelection and he's reached the age where he could run for office so he can vote how he wanted without consequence.  

19, Male, Independent, CA-12
[ Parent ]
Delaware is a complete disaster
but has nothing at all in common with WV.  Manchin will announce for the seat within 72 hours, maybe 72 minutes.

It's exact opposite behavior of Delaware.

[ Parent ]
Seems like good caretaker
It was better that he didn't appoint a fixture.

24, male, African-American, CA-24, Democrat. Chair of the SSP Black Caucus.
All that matters is that he votes yes for unemployment....
If he does that, he's filled his role....
His only difficult moment will be...
...if there's a floor vote on an energy/climate bill.  If there's a vote on utilities-only carbon emissions control, that still is a heavy lift in West Virginia where cap-and-trade is death.  And that's the one thing Goodwin has to deal with that carries potential carryover risks to Manchin.  But it's a tough vote regardless of who's appointed, it has nothing to do with Goodwin.

43, male, Indian-American, Democrat, VA-10
[ Parent ]
This is one place where we really miss Byrd
Byrd in his final days had come around to some kind of climate legislation and led the fight against blocking EPA regulation of carbon.  And he had the stature to convince his state that it was the right thing to do.

"The truth is that some form of climate legislation will likely become public policy" and will adversely affect coal mining, warning, "West Virginians can choose to anticipate change and adapt to it or resist and be overrun by it."

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US...

I think that not having a healthy Kennedy and Byrd really hurt Obama and his agenda in the Senate, and thus hurt the Democrats politically.  If Kennedy was not ill will cancer, I have little doubt that a health care bill would been signed in 2009 and the political cost for passing it would have been much less.  

[ Parent ]
Agreed
With Kennedy gone due to illness, there was a void to fill leadership wise. I agree if Kennedy was in the Senate running the show HCR wise, it would of passed much more quickly. But regardless the political cost of passing it is still less because we got the shit done but that going off topic (actually this entire thread is off topic with going from talking about WV-Sen to DE-Sen)so i'll stop. Shame the guy for years talked about HCR and the time when we were actually going to do it, he gets ill and eventually dies. Fucking shame. that's what it is

22, Male, Democrat, PA-18.
[ Parent ]
Carte
I wonder if he stands to inherit the Smarte Carte fortune. I love using their product whenever I travel via an American airport. Those are some damn sturdy Cartes.  
Hopefully this Carte brings fortune to our prospects
in retaining our Congressional seats!

party: Democratic, ideology: moderate, district: CT-01
[ Parent ]
WV-Sen: Goodwin's Law | 40 comments

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