August 25, 2009
(Massachusetts) - OK. Ted Kennedy is dead. You'd think, by the network media's
adulation that he was the Saviour of Mankind.
But, to be realistic, remember that he is the last of the phony "Camelot" myth. There is
no doubt that his dad was a crook, manipulating the New York Stock Exchange and running
rum and whiskey from Canada to Boston during prohibition. It is instructive. Even then,
the Kennedys were above the law - telling people what they should and should not do, but
not living by their own prescriptions.
We'll never know if Joe Junior would have been a good president, because he died a hero
in WWII. And he really was. A fearless pilot, by all reports, and a gentleman to boot.
Jack was not the Progressive that a lot of his followers thought he was. When he tried to
do away with the Federal Reserve, revert to specie, revise taxes downward, and open up
a dialogue (instead of demands) for integration, tried to put an end to union corruption, he
got killed. It isn't crazy to say that he was probably killed by his own people, whoever
did the actual shooting. Yes, he was unfaithful, certainly not as many times as Bobby, but
enough to make you wonder. But, if for no other reason than his handling of the Cuban Missile
Crisis, he needs to be graded a B+. The very best of the family.
Bobby was another matter. He was a fire-breathing, radical Liberal. His passion for other
women was more Sicillian than Irish. Again, we'll never know what kind of President he would
have made. Maybe that's a good thing.
Having interviewed Ted Kennedy twice after Chappaquiddick, this reporter can verify that
he was as shallow as a person in public life can afford to be. He was a "hale fellow well
met" and a great partier. He cheated in college, having cheated to get in. He used to make
waitress sandwiches with Sen. Dodd in favorite pubs around Boston. There are pictures
lying in the basements of several newspapers. This shows how completely untouchable he
was. Even after the Mary Jo Kopechne death in Massachusetts' murky waters.
It is probably not a stretch to say that the guilt from the Kopechne death and his father's
ill-gotten fortune spurred him on to do good. The problem has always been that he tried
to do it with someone else's money. Ours.
He, like Obama, meant well and became bad for America.
There is no joy in the death of this Liberal. But like a man being hit by a hammer, America
can rejoice in the wonderfulness of stopping the practice.
- Dick Anderson
