Ted Kennedy, tarnished but true liberal hero
The Age
Thursday August 27, 2009
EDWARD Moore Kennedy, senior US Senator for Massachusetts, lived a life that seemed to epitomise all the contradictions of his famous family. Senator Kennedy, who died yesterday aged 77, after a year-long struggle with a brain tumour, was not able to pursue the same presidential ambitions as his older brothers John Fitzgerald and Robert Francis. But neither did he succumb, as they did, to an assassin's bullets.Edward Kennedy succeeded to the Senate seat that John vacated when elected president, though not immediately; at 28 he was two years too young to serve in the chamber, and the seat was "kept warm" until he reached 30 by Benjamin Smith, a family retainer. Edward thereafter held it continuously, making him the third-longest serving member of the Senate at the time of his death. It was assumed that he, too, as patriarch of the Kennedy clan after Robert's death, would follow his brothers' path in seeking the presidency, but that goal became unattainable after the death by drowning in 1969 of Mary Jo Kopechne, a former aide to Robert, in a car accident for which Edward was responsible. It was the most memorable, but not the only, scandal of his career, and although he did eventually announce a presidential bid, in 1980, the Democratic nomination went to Jimmy Carter.Most Americans, however, will not judge his legacy by the scandals, or by the now rather tarnished Kennedy mystique.Edward Kennedy was the standard bearer of the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, who kept that flame alive when it was most beleaguered, during the presidencies of Ronald Reagan and of George Bush, father and son. He campaigned especially for health-care reform and if universal health cover is eventually available to all Americans the achievement will belong as much to him as to the Obama Administration.
© 2009 The Age
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