Lionized in Winter

At 85, Robert Byrd has become an overnight Internet sensation and the Senate's unlikeliest liberal

In the history of the republic, 11,707 men and women have served in Congress. Only two have held office longer than Robert Byrd, first elected to the House in 1952 and the Senate in '58. He has been around long enough to have served with a Connecticut Brahmin named Prescott Bush, the President's grandfather. With his white hair, benign tremor and penchant for quoting the Romans, Byrd seems more like a Senator from the 19th century than one from the 21st. He has never seen MTV. He refers to the camera in the Senate chamber as "the eee-leck-tronic eye." But due...

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