Remembering the Real Deal

The light has gone out, and with it that infectious warm laugh and intensely progressive commitment of the best of the Kennedys. Not, at this point, to take anything away from the memory of his siblings -- Bobby, whom I also got to know, was pretty terrific in his last years -- but Senator Ted Kennedy was the real deal.

Unable to move with his brothers' intellectual alacrity, sometimes plodding in impromptu expression but smooth and skillful while reading from a script, the youngest Kennedy made up for his shortcomings early in his Senate career by resolutely working the substance of issues. His principled determination, plus his capacity to truly care about the real-world outcomes of legislation for ordinary people rather than its impact on his or anyone else's election, became his signature qualities as a lawmaker. But for those same reasons, he also wanted legislation passed, and his ability to work with the opposition, as he did three years ago with John McCain on immigration reform, now grants him a legacy as one of the nation's great senators.

Oddly enough, for one born into such immense familial expectations, he was a surprisingly accessible and down-to-earth politician in the eyes of most journalists who covered him. I think of him as always authentic and never oily. As opposed to most politicians, the offstage Ted Kennedy was the more appealing one.

Although he excelled as an orator, never more so than delivering the speech that Bob Shrum crafted for him at the 1980 Democratic Convention but which was informed by Kennedy's own deeply felt passion, it was in his less choreographed moments that he was at his best. I spent quite a few hours over the years interviewing him on subjects ranging from health care to nuclear arms control, mostly as a reporter for the Los Angeles Times, and while his grammar could be troubling, his sentiments never were.

Not once in those interviews did I find Kennedy to equivocate or slide into the amoral triangulation that defines almost all successful politicians. They position themselves, but he took positions, and as in the case of health care reform, he would end his life fighting for those causes with his last breath.

I would put Kennedy alongside my other hero, George McGovern, as the two most trusted standard-bearers of the Democratic Party's too-often-sabotaged liberalism. I just could never imagine either of them ever selling us out. Indeed, I haven't felt quite so sad about the passing of a political leader since the day when people started bawling all over the Bronx with the news that FDR had died. In a political world dominated by bipartisan cynicism, there are few touchstones of integrity for the common folk, and Kennedy was one of them.

Lest I be accused of surrendering to the emotions of the moment, let me quote from a column I wrote in January of 2008 when the Democratic presidential primary battle hung in the balance:

It should mean a great deal to progressives that in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination Sen. Ted Kennedy favors Sen. Barack Obama over two other colleagues he has worked with in the Senate. No one in the history of that institution has been a more consistent and effective fighter than Kennedy for an enlightened agenda, be it civil rights and liberty, gender equality, labor and immigrant justice, environmental protection, educational opportunity or opposing military adventures.

Kennedy was a rare sane voice among the Democrats in strongly opposing the Iraq war, and it is no small tribute when he states: "We know the record of Barack Obama. There is the courage he showed when so many others were silent or simply went along. From the beginning, he opposed the war in Iraq. And let no one deny that truth."

Hopefully, it will be added to Ted Kennedy's legacy that he was right about Obama just as he was consistently right on every major issue that he dealt with as a senator. Kennedy's endorsement of Obama was critical to our current president's historic nomination and election, and it is therefore fitting that the favor of that all-important endorsement be returned with a significant reform of the ailing U.S. health care system.

In the first year of the George W. Bush presidency, I wrote a column for the Los Angeles Times entitled "Bush Could Really Use a Fireside Chat with FDR," stating, "This is a president who never learned that it is possible to be a leader born of privilege and yet be absorbed with the fate of those in need. ... Not so Roosevelt, a true aristocrat whose genuine love of the common man united this country to save it during its most severe time of economic turmoil and devastating war." Kennedy wrote me a note thanking me for the column and adding, "I can think of at least fifty on the Senate side of Capital Hill that could benefit from a good fireside chat as well."

That's also a worthy epitaph for Ted Kennedy: Born of privilege, and yet absorbed with the fate of those in need.

Comments

[creolechild]

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https://www.madashelldoctorstour.com/Mad_as_Hell_Video.html

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[1logicalthinker]

This is a great tribute to a Great American, Ted Kennedy, coming from another Great American, Robert Scheer.

[Macready]

Thank you Robert Scheer . . . Ted Kennedy was a truly great man . . . I do so wish his Liberal legacy can live again in American politics . . . we have lost a great deal with his passing

[Asinistra]

Robert Scheer's unflinching, incisive look at Chappaquiddick is the must read book for both Kennedy haters and lovers who can't let the ugly of the past go. It's a tribute to Scheer's astonishing intellectual integrity that he could write both that book and this eulogy...a liberal journalist of the highest order.

[cayuse]

Joe Kennedy got rich and made a difference to change the world with his children. A well known story in my day. Thank you for stating this fact once again on his passing.

Interesting when you hear of Kennedy's as booze runners when they only bought the right to sell Gordon's Gin and ? Scotch which made them millions. A legal business investment not a mafia run business. Comming from a family where I did not know until I was 24 that my grandad was not a good farmer, but a good corn mash and moonshiner. Hearing a story from a person 2 farms from by Grandad about 3000 miles from home. Who said if not for my grandad and his business they would have starved during the Great Depression.

I could go on speaking of stories that are prevelent today that may or may not carry weight, but cannot distract from the legacy that his family that they surely laid down their life for their country. Yet this family tried to prevent the need for anyone to have to give their life for their country by creating Peaceful Coexistence around the globe or to have their contribution to society wiped out by corruption.

[mjc]

While Bobby Kennedy was my hero, of course I believe we will miss the real power and compassion that Ted Kennedy brought to the Senate. I really wonder, though, if Ted Kennedy would have really appreciated the way Barack Obama has been treating the issue of health care for Americans. Wobbling here and there with this Senator or Congressman was never Kennedy's style and he really personally courted his opponents; Obama has none of that style. Kennedy and some of the family bought into Obama's campaign words and supported him in the primary. Those words are now dust for the most part.

[abigail1]

"his capacity to truly care about the real-world outcomes of legislation for ordinary people rather than its impact on his or anyone else's election"
that's what we will miss most of all.

godspeed, Senator Kennedy, and thank you.

[plumnelly]

Very well said, we will miss his stature as a congressman, not too many left who give a damn anymore about anyone else but themselves. The people will carry on his work for a people's healthcare plan as opposed to a wall street insurance plan. Thank you, Senator Kennedy, for everything you did for the people, you will be remembered for your tireless fight for us.

[cayuse]

I here many reference to God Speed. I think that is a great wish and honorable expression.

Life and Death of the body is the cycle of life itself. Death of the body for the return to the Eternal Life without a body. God Bless that Ted could go in his own time, much easier for me to understand and accept. than the FATE/Cause and Effect of his brothers.

[RepugsOut08]

Thank you, Mr. Scheer. Unfortunately, it sometimes takes the death of a great person, for some to realise how much that person achieved for them in life.
In the coming days, no doubt, millions will be hearing of the many benefits they take for granted, that this man helped make a part of their lives.
We owe it to Teddy, to make his dream of Medicare For All a reality. And when we do, the legislation should bear his name.
God speed Senator Kennedy.

[Gib]

Well said, Mr Scheer.

[noradunn]

Ted Kennedy was the only liberal democrat left who didn't apologized for being one. He was probably more effective as a senator than he might have been as a president. It's been exhilarating to follow him over the years as he matured in his personal life and emerged as the most respected voice in the senate.
Yes, he had integrity. He didn't sell out and he couldn't be bought, and he stands among the giants as far as I'm concerned, going all the way back to John Adams.

[cayuse]

Senators who defied bullying by Team Bush and had the wisdom and courage to vote "nay" on October 11, 2002.

Here are the brave ones:

Daniel Akaka (D-HI)
Jeff Bingaman (D-NM)
Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
Robert Byrd (D-WV)
Lincoln Chafee (R-RI)
Kent Conrad (D-ND)
Jon Corzine (D-NJ)
Mark Dayton (D-MN)
Richard Durbin (D-IL)
Russell Feingold (D-WI)
Robert Graham (D-FL)
Daniel Inouye (D-HI)
James Jeffords (I-VT)
Edward Kennedy (D-MA)
Patrick Leahy (D-VT)
Carl Levin (D-MI)
Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)
Patty Murray (D-WA)
Jack Reed (D-RI)
Paul Sarbanes (D-MD)
Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)
Paul Wellstone (D-MN)
Ron Wyden (D-OR)

[Ikkru]

The passing of Senator Kennedy will truncate the amount of political capital that the GOP has in its account as President Obama uses reconciliation to push through a health-care program WITH a public option.

[RepugsOut08]

Yes! The Kennedy Universal health Care Reform bill.

[plumnelly]

Yes!

[cayuse]

Almighty Dollar is not NATURE or from NATURES GOD. It is man made and does little to inspire me as so many man made thing of today.

Health Care should be the right of every person in a country where inherited wealth receives 60% of all corporate profit and contributes 0 sweat and genius