I don't even think it's close.
I take history very seriously, have studied it closely, and I am not given to hyperbole (as awful as George W. Bush was, for example, I still hesitate to join the many historians who call him the worst President ever, because James Buchanan was truly horrendous). But with Teddy Kennedy, I don't think there is much debate.
There were other Senators who served a very long time and have many notable achievements to their credit. There were others whose oratory and personality dominated the Senate chamber for awhile. There were others who were held in great esteem by their Senate colleagues. There were others who became a recognizable face as a representative of Senate traditions and honor. But no one in all of America's great history combined all of these things with getting more tangible things that mattered accomplished for the American people.
On issue after issue, Ted Kennedy was at the center of the debate, and he delivered one great piece of legislation after another to all of us. There was not a single significant issue that he didn't play an important role on in the past 45 years.
It saddens me beyond words that he passed before seeing health care reform finally get passed, as it had become the great passion of his life. I hope we can finally get it done for him now.
https://www.madashelldoctorstour.com/Mad_as_Hell_Video.html
These Oregon physicians are in the process of organizing a caravan designed to inform the public about the benefits of the single-payer option. At last count they will be stopping in approximately 23 states, on their way to demonstrate in Washington. They need volunteers and our support. Please spread the word.
Two competitors for the Greatest Senator Ever (at least to my mind) remain Robert Wagner of New York and Charles Sumner, also of Masschusetts. What Wagner did (with FDR) to create the modern labor movement, and what Sumner did, before, during, and after the Civil War, actually changed history. What the country would be like without the Wagner Act is hard to imagine. Similarly, how Lincoln succeeds without the pressure of the Radical Republicans is unimaginable, not to mention Sumner's role in Reconstruction after Lincoln's assassination.
None of this is to minimize the contributions of the estimable Sen. Kennedy. I am certianly not looking forward to a U.S. Senate without him. It's never happened in my professional life! The two challenges that we face now are (1) how to finish what Kennedy called "the cause of my life" which is real health care reform; and (2) how do find/create the next progressive Senate leader. Neither will be easy, but both have to be done.
Something enormus and profound passed today. The last of the Kennedy brothers. Whether you liked them or not you cannot deny the size of the imprint they made on this country and it's politics. Ted Kennedy served as long as JFK's lifespan and longer than RFK's. I am grateful we got to see one of them grow grey and old and die a natural death. I personally feel a giant loss. As an actual working senator he is unsurpassed. He will go down as the greatest senator of the 20th century.
Godspeed Teddy!
1. Henry Clay
2. Daniel Webster
3. John C. Calhoun
4. Robert Taft
5. Stephen Douglas
Far better in my eyes, is a public servant who puts his hand to various jobs, and does well at all of them. And one who is involved in more than just standing in the spotlight, one who sponsors and actively participates in other organizations/forums that better our world. Elihu Root comes to mind.
Besides, during his tenure the individual citizens portion of the national debt went from about $1000 to $32000 per person (rough numbers there, but close enough). Not sure if I am going to call anybody who had their hands involved in that little tidbit "great". Its easy to pass all kinds of great legislation to help everybody out if you just keeping passing the bill on to your kids.
One of the good guys, for sure....not great.
But, let history decided.
The Iraq war was the most egregious act ever committed by a U.S. president. Morally, strategically, politically, militarily, economically--any way you want to look at it, Bush's war was a disaster without precedent. Vietnam was ugly for many of the same reasons, but it took four presidents many years to create that mess; Bush proudly created his all by himself in just a few weeks. The Iraqi body count, whatever estimate you choose to believe (maybe someday our government will tell us how many innocent families in Iraq were destroyed with our tax dollars), is enough to reserve Bush a furnace-side seat in the hottest corner of presidential hell.
Pierce, Harding, Grant, and Buchanan might have been hapless ne'er-do-wells who presided over corrupt administrations, but they didn't use baldfaced lies as an excuse to take over a non-belligerent country and slaughter innocent people.