Mark Steyn on Kennedy Hagiography

Mark Steyn, as usual, says best the way I feel about Kennedy's passing (in case that's scrolled off, you can find my thoughts, here).

While Liberals are spending the day mourning the loss of the "greatest legislator" (is having your name on 1000 bills really an accomplishment?) or the "Lion" of the Senate (doesn't that just mean he spoke a lot?) or the last great "civil" senator (tell that to Robert Bork), I guess I am spending it wondering why they love this SOB who left a 29 year old woman to die.

But, "it's the body of his work, the totality of the man" they say.

Say it all you want, why would I expect people who don't care whether an unborn child is killed to care about Mary Jo Kopechne's death and the Senator's culpability in it, and the character his actions afterward revealed.

They don't care. He was right on their issues, and he was moderately effective. Who cares what he might have done. If serial abuser (if not rapist) Bill Clinton can be forgiven (hell, he even had one female columnist promising to fellate him) because he pledged to protect a woman's womb, surely Ted Kennedy is forgiven murder for 40 years of adherence to liberal orthodoxy.

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Ted Kennedy's Legacy: OJ Simpson

Frank Fleming, publisher of IMAO.com and Pajamas Media contributor, has it about right on Ted Kennedy when he says,

"What was his civil rights legacy? He was a rich white guy who killed a woman and got away without consequences, and so paved the way that one day a black man, O.J. Simpson, could do the same?"

Other than that, I don't really see what greatness Ted Kennedy brought to his life and to our world.

The guy was a drunken lecher, who happened to be borne into the American version of royalty. He was the progeny of a man, Joseph P Kennedy, who today would be the poster child to the Left of all that is wrong with corporate America. And, sometimes when you listen to the Left complain and rail on the evil executive class, you have to wonder if Teddy hadn't just delivered a speech to them on his own father's life.

In his own life, Ted Kennedy will always be remembered, by me, for allowing a young girl, Mary Jo Kopechne, to die in his car after he crashed off an embankment at Chappaquidick Island, MA. He failed to report the incident for 10 hours, and, in the real world that the rest of us live in, would have been found guilty of manslaughter, at the least. But, like OJ, the Kennedy's don't live in our world. Kennedy did plea to a misdemeanor Leaving the Scene of an Accident charge, and got two months probation.

Listening yesterday to some people talk about Senator Kennedy, it was clear he was a likable guy, as most Irish drunks are. People enjoyed his company. He lived life hard, but he had the wealth and privilege to do that without serious repercussions. Orrin Hatch related a time where Kennedy had played a song (I guess that Hatch had composed) for his 2nd wife (oh, yes, did I mention he was also a serial philanderer), and he called Hatch to thank him and tell him how well received it was. The funny part (to Hatch, certainly not to taxpayers) was that Hatch received this call while working in Washington, from Kennedy, on the family boat with his significant other. When Hatch asked Kennedy why he wasn't working, Kennedy just laughed. Joke was on you, Massachusetts residents who elected this guy 7 times.

Another story teller (friend, Ed Kleine) related during a discussion on “The Diane Rehm Show” on National Public Radio (H/T The Examiner):

"I don't know if you know this or not, but one of his favorite topics of humor was indeed Chappaquiddick itself. And he would ask people, ‘Have you heard any new jokes about Chappaquiddick?’ I mean that is just the most amazing thing. It's not that he didn't feel remorse about the death of Mary Jo Kopechne, but that he still always saw the other side of everything and the ridiculous side of things, too. "

Don't believe me, listen yourself:


I'm sure Ted Kennedy was a lovable drunk. Many are. Many are just sad caricatures of lives wasted and what could have been. His God, and mine, has forgiven him his sins, so may he rest in peace.

But, how should he be remembered by the living?

Ted Kennedy was an Irish Catholic who was pro abortion with a hard-Left voting record which insulated him from any attacks on his Left. He "championed" every Liberal cause that came along for 40 years, and fought the less Liberal members of his own party, including presidents (Clinton, Carter). He was surely an effective legislator for the Left. They will remember him as the "Lion of the Senate" (whatever the hell that means) and the Right will remember him as the poster child for wealth and privilege run amok.

I will just try NOT to remember him. He has personally destroyed one life, and has tried to destroy the America the Founders created for 40 years.

Good riddance, Ted.