Amen.

Kennedy was in a category all by himself, they just don't seem to make them like him any more. Even though I knew this was coming, I am incredibly saddened by the passing of the Liberal Lion.

He died in the midst of another great fight, almost at his last breath. Do not go gentle, indeed.

Edward Kennedy was and is an inspiration for those of us who have stumbled a few times along the way; what matters is the whole life and what one does with it. Kennedy might have done less, aimed less high, lived down to partisan expectations...but he did not. Neither should his Congressional colleagues or, for that matter, should we.

Many years ago, I was a bit player for a meeting in Senator Kennedy's private office. I've been pretty inoculated against political show -- but I was flat-out amazed at how there wasn't a bare patch of wall anywhere in that place that wasn't covered with something meaningful: boxing gloves (autographed by Muhammad Ali), photographs that I recognized from Time and Newsweek when I was a kid, except here there were actually family pix of Kennedy and his brothers... and it really hit me that these guys WERE brothers. (I have some, I recognized the body language.)

But what really struck me was the list, right inside the door of the outer office, of something like 400 Senators whom Kennedy had served with.

I worked for five years sitting five feet from somebody who had worked for Bobby, then for Ted, so her take on him is as good as any: she explained that he always reminded her of the line from Shakespeare, that some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have it dropped on 'em like a ton of bricks. She thought that Joe, Sr., had surely wanted Joe Jr. to be President, and when he was killed in the War it all shifted to Jack... and then to Bobby, but frankly Ted would have been happier as a bartender. (He was, after all, a genuine football player: scored the only touchdown in his Harvard/Yale game, which they lost.)

Anybody who worked in politics, and especially those with Senate experience, knows Kennedy stories -- about how he could be utterly baffling in his legislative strategies,the utterly loopy 1980 campaign that ended so brilliantly in Reagan's election, that he didn't always get out of his colleague's way when they thought, sometimes rightly, that they had earned the spotlight which followed Ted Kennedy around.

But the fact is, for literally generations, wherever Ted Kennedy sat in the Senate was the head of the table.

I wish he'd done better by Kopechne, but I'm not sorry he was never President. I heard a couple people -- the first two comments! -- on the radio at 7 this morning attacking him for being an 'elitist', and for getting away with murder.

But I think my lasting image of the guy is gonna be from last year's speech in Denver, when he had already gotten a death sentence from his doctors. Somebody else might have made a swan song, but he gave a speech talking about what he wanted to achieve in the Senate before he died: health care reform at last.

The nastiest lede I ever read in my life was from a profile of Kennedy done 20 years ago: "Up close, the face is a shock...", which was true.

But I think the stunning thing, for any of us who lives to see it, will be how Ted Kennedy's place in history is going to be so favorable, up close, as time goes by. There's an old Irish line about how there's no point in being human if you don't know the world will break your heart in the end.

And yet I expect that Kennedy himself knew a different story, which is a better example right now: Ted Williams never won a World Series -- but he did hit his last pitch out of the park.

Let's get a goddam health care bill to the President worth naming after the guy: then he can RIP.

Now we have a special election to fill the vacant seat. Cue Joe Lieberman "reluctantly" choosing to endorse whatever candidate the Massachusetts Republican Party puts forward. You know, for the good of the nation. After all, circumstances have changed since Obama was elected. Blah, blah...bipartisanship...blah, blah,...integrity...blah blah,...change....blah, blah...deficits.......ad nauseam.

Amen. RIP.

Luckily, the Republicans, in Kennedy's honor, will continue lying about the HELP bill.

Oh thank goodness ! Someone mercifully brought up saint joe , I
thought I would never smile again , for a grim moment .

Let's get a goddam health care bill to the President worth naming after the guy: then he can RIP.

Amen to that, Americanist.

Speaking of Kennedy and his brothers, how strange it must have been for him to have outlived all of his brothers by over four decades. Jack and Bobby are dim memories from my childhood, but Teddy's been fighting the good fight for most of my 55 years.

Let's give our Congresscritters no rest until they pass that bill.

An era has ended. RIP, Senator.

Thank you, Senator Kennedy, for your countless years of service to your country. You will be sorely missed. My condolences to the Kennedy family. Fly swiftly to the other side, Senator Kennedy.

.
Fox News Headline: "CHAPPAQUIDDICK!"

If assassinations only make eternal symbols out of martyrs, try character assassination.

And, that kiddies, is why Americans are dying for lack of healthcare.
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Ted Kennedy drew a lot of fire for accusing the Bush administration of playing politics with the Iraq War, but history proved that he was right to accuse Richard Nixon of timing American withdrawal from Vietnam to his 1972 reelection campaign.

http://fatalpolitics.blogspot.com/

Ken Hughes

Presidential Recordings Program

Miller Center
University of Virginia

I was watching TV when the story broke. Oddly, ABC was the only network to cover it for a good 5 minutes. Fox had McCain and Greta van Gargoyle and it was a good 15 mins before they even broke it. When they did, it was 2 min blurb (which seemed sincere) and went back to the gargoyle woman.

OT Please try to see the CSPAN coverage of the townhall meeting last night with Rep. Moran and Howard Dean in Reston VA. Randall Terry shows up and trying to shout Moran down. Instead Democrats got rowdy, shut that fucker up and he was ushered out. It was a beautiful thing.

And this November, the torch will be passed again to a new generation of Americans. -Senator Kennedy

Well, we're still trying to pry the torch away from your Senate brothers and sisters, but we appreciate all the help you gave us. Thanks, and rest in peace.

One of the truly remarkable things about Ted Kennedy was that he wasn't an elitist at all, despite family wealth that clearly put him in the elite. So many of his legislative achievements were clearly aimed at making life better for all Americans, not just the wealthy few. I'm sorry he didn't live to see health care reform in the U.S. (never mind universal health care). I'm sure it would have been his proudest legacy, and I hope he can still have it. They should put his picture in the dictionary next to the definition for nobilesse oblige.

RIP Ted Kennedy.

Hopefully Kennedy's passing will refocus attention on universal healthcare, and help it happen. That would be a memorial he would approve of. Although his living presence in the Senate is what is desperately needed.

The torch has been passed: but to whom?

He lived about 40 years too long. He should have died by lethal injection like the murderer that he was. Can't understand why he was held in any esteem.

rick....

get ahold of your irrational outrage..

name one state that uses the death penalty for at the worst...d-u-i homicide by vehicle?

I hope Ted finds what he didn't find much of on this earth. Peace. Only God can know the heart of a man. Let Him decide the value of this man, and may that same grace be ours someday.