The passing of Ted Kennedy gives rise to a number of thoughts. My first is that he has a soul and he now stands before a just God.
Many commentators this morning were commenting at how skillfully Senator Kennedy could bring warring colleagues in the Senate together to get legislation passed. If you hold the same opinion of the Republican party that I do, you might agree that getting Republicans to agree with Democrats is not such a big deal. Beyond that, the nod toward Kennedy's alleged powers of reconciliation is a forceful argument against allowing anyone to serve for so long as an elected representative in the government - almost 47 years for Kennedy. When politicians have been so long tenured that they become "brokers" that is the cue for their exit.
The Kennedy family as a whole aspired to form the core of America's aristocracy. There were many throughout the past 70+ years who were happy to confer that status on them. Despite all the recent wailing about Bush and Clinton dynasties, the Kennedy reach for dynasty has been taken as a given.
Most self-propelled claims to human pre-eminance seem to begin and end in debauchery, and the Kennedy clan has illustrated this well. Roger Kimball observes: “'Edward M. Kennedy,' I heard echoing behind those words, 'Liar, cheat, drunk, philanderer, and — let’s not forget — inadvertent murderer.' The tsunami of sentimental pap about Kennedy is already churning, gushing, rushing to inundate the public with a nauseating and untruthful fairy tale about the “Lion of the Senate.”
It is important for the health of our Republic for the truth to be told and this can be done without judgment or recrimination. Leave that to the Ultimate Judge. As I said at the beginning, Ted Kennedy now stands before a just God. And let us take from the example of the life of the deceased the lessons we can learn to prepare for the the next pretender to the throne who will inexorably appear - if he hasn't already.
