On why she is involved with Rock the Vote: “In particular, for me, being a new mother, you know, it was really important for me to get involved and get excited about this election in particular, being such one of change and new development for our country and for the future of my son. You know, being a new mother, I just want the best possibilities for him so I was extra excited about getting involved.“

Asked whether she had any qualms about “displaying” her baby boy in the commercial, Aguilera replied, “What a great way to sort of subject him in such a positive way and in such a great time in history to do something as positive as getting people to vote and getting people to care about their country and get excited about this change?“

On plans for her to sing “America the Beautiful” as part of the project: “It was really, really nice to bring it down to a really intimate moment between me and my son and kind of symbolizing what this song means in the sense that it’s passing it on to the next generation. It’s trying to contribute in a way to make the future better for my son.“

Aguilera admits that, although she registered to vote “as soon as (she) could,“ it wasn’t until the last election that she actually did, a circumstance she calls “embarrasing.“

You know, I sort of grew up—as I’m sure a lot of people out there probably do the same. A lot of people give up on politics. A lot of people are like, oh, there’s so much dishonesty, I just want to wash my hands of the whole thing.

But I sort of grew up in a house where politics weren’t discussed. It wasn’t really something that was talked about, different issues, concerns. It was sort of a hopeless situation in my home. And as I grew up and became a woman myself, started caring about certain things such as domestic violence, being the background that I came from and whatnot, certain issues were brought up to me that I felt, you know, I can voice my opinion, I can change how the world is.

You know, it takes one person. And then, you know, it goes from there. And so the last election was the one which I had done Declare Yourself, the campaign there with Norman Lear where I really made it a point to get out there and really encourage others to vote and really exercise—and as a woman, that’s embarrassing for me that it took me that long just because, you know, we weren’t always give than right and I think it’s really taken for granted, especially with the younger generation now, you know? So it’s something that I really, really am adamant about getting out there.

Aguilera said she believes young people who don’t vote aren’t “seeing the bigger picture.

“I think when you’re young, you have the sense, too, that you’re sort of invincible and—or that you’re not taken seriously, and that it will matter later on, later on down, down the road maybe.

“But, really, you know, time goes quickly. I’m 27 years old, but already, you know, being a mother and ... things happen,“ she said. “And it’s so important to get involved. And I think now more than ever actually I think young people are really getting involved. I think with the Internet boom over the years and everything being so accessible at the press of a button at your fingertips, I think, you know, anything is available to you as far as information and whatnot. So I think it’s—now more than ever it’s a great time to get involved.“

Aguilera called this presidential campaign “a ground-breaking time in history. I mean, we had a woman running for president, which was pretty much unheard of. An African-American running for president. So it’s just exciting, the change that has come to our country and just to get involved and—and I think, also, that’s another reason why young people might be more motivated now to vote, just because they can see, you know, what might have been even unheard of or unthinkable even last election, it’s right here and right now and very present and this is the moment. This is the moment.“

The original Rock the Vote campaign, which featured Madonna in a spinoff of her hit “Vogue” in 1992, led to the registrations of “hundreds of thousands of young people” and “a huge increase in young voter turnout that year,“ according to the campaign’s director, Heather Smith. This year’s campaign seeks to register two million young voters—a drive Smith said would be the “largest youth voter registration campaign in history by about three-and-a-half times”—in anticipation of the 2008 general election, which she says she expects to draw “the largest increase of young voters at the polls in our nation’s history.“

An interesting aside: Smith noted that, in a great twist of irony, John McCain and Barack Obama each won Rock the Vote’s awards in 2005 for doing “great young voter outreach.“

The 44 million young people in America comprise one-fifth of this country’s voting population.

Let the games begin!

Byrne says he considers the early jockeying for position among potential gubernatorial candidates, which is already going on, to be “way premature.“ He says he hasn’t made a decision whether to run for governor; in fact, he says, “Frankly, I haven’t thought that much about it ... I just don’t have time to deal with it.“ Byrne adds that he won’t be pressured by other factors or potential rivals into making a decision before he’s ready; “I’m just going to move on what I think is the appropriate schedule for me and not on what other people think ought to be the schedule for me ... I am just not going to let myself be sucked into that.“

When it comes time to decide, Byrne says the number one factor influencing his choice will be his family: “If it really didn’t work for the family, then we wouldn’t do it. That’s a no-brainer.“ Following on the heels of that consideration will be a sober look at his electability. “I don’t believe in going off on a fool’s errand. Just because people come up to me from time-to-time and say, ‘I wish you’d run for governor,’ doesn’t mean that I’m necessarily electable ... What may seem like the right thing to do today may not be the right thing to do two years from now or a year from now,“ he says.

Byrne expects that the Democratic nominee for governor will be U.S. Rep. Artur Davis. Davis, Byrne says, is “a very smart, articulate guy and will run a very effective campaign,“ Byrne says, adding that Davis “would be very hard to beat in a Democratic primary.“

Byrne doesn’t intend to follow political ambition out of Alabama, “even to become a United States senator,“ Helen writes. “It doesn’t interest me AT ALL,“ Byrne says.

And although Byrne hasn’t engaged in decision-making processes yet, perhaps we can gain a window into his thinking from this statement:

“And I think there’s so many important things for us to be doing here in Alabama in state government, I really do. We have good people that represent us in Washington. We’ve got good senators and good congressmen, we’ve got some retirements coming here that I know are going to be a loss for the state, but I just don’t feel like it’s a great need for our state.”

“But I do think there’s a great need in our state for strong leaders on the state level. I think that’s been a problem that’s plagued us for a long time. And now that we’ve seen a true, new South, progressive governor in Governor Riley, we all understand we want to keep that. We want to keep going in that direction. If I’m going to do anything, it will be in that area, it will not be in trying to go to Washington.”

A guy like Byrne isn’t going to go where he feels he isn’t needed. But will he go where he believes there is a need?

Finally, in my opinion, the most refreshing thing Byrne said was this:

“I’ve probably learned, even more than I already knew, just how imperfect I am ... I knew I was imperfect before I started, but when you get into a process like this you have a lot of people who are paying very close attention to what you’re doing and providing criticism along the way. Sometimes they’re right. And it would be very tempting for me to say all the criticism leveled at me is wrong, but I think there have been sometimes that people have said some things that were negative about my performance where I had to stop and listen and learn.”

Wow.

Bradley Byrne is a pragmatic, bottom-line kind of guy. It seems to me that he is concerned more with what makes common sense than with what fits the party line. Maybe I’m wrong. But it’s hard to find partisan fault with a guy whose critics are almost exclusively Democrats but whose praises are being sung by most of the editorial boards throughout the state.

Byrne says he considers Davis the Democrats’ presumptive gubernatorial nominee.

I say Byrne is Davis’ presumptive gubernatorial opponent.

Read Helen’s narrative of the interview, along with reader comments, here. Note that Helen will have more coming from her interview with Byrne, including his take on taxes and the Alabama Legislature.