Senator Ted Kennedy Passes Away [Archive]

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CountArach

08-26-2009, 08:51

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/TedKennedy/story?id=6692022

Sen. Ted Kennedy died shortly before midnight Tuesday at his home in Hyannis Port, Mass., at age 77.

The man known as the "liberal lion of the Senate" had fought a more than year-long battle with brain cancer, and according to his son had lived longer with the disease than his doctors expected him to.

"We've lost the irreplaceable center of our family and joyous light in our lives, but the inspiration of his faith, optimism, and perseverance will live on in our hearts forever," the Kennedy family said in a statement. "He loved this country and devoted his life to serving it."

Sen. Edward Moore Kennedy, the youngest Kennedy brother who was left to head the family's political dynasty after his brothers President John F. Kennedy and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated.
This really does sadden me despite not being an American. Truly he always seemed to be a man with his heart in the right place who legitimately wanted to help people. I'm sure he will be sorely missed.

RIP :bow:

InsaneApache

08-26-2009, 10:55

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/TedKennedy/story?id=6692022

This really does sadden me despite not being an American. Truly he always seemed to be a man with his heart in the right place who legitimately wanted to help people. I'm sure he will be sorely missed.

RIP :bow:

I'll wait until the guys cold before I rip him a new one.

Crazed Rabbit

08-26-2009, 11:10

A formidable politician.

RIP.

CR

JAG

08-26-2009, 13:35

The left in the US loses one of their finest spokesman.

RIP. :bow:

Furunculus

08-26-2009, 14:46

even Hannan was a fan of sorts -

"Ted Kennedy was wrong about most things, but he was a great parliamentarian":
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/danielhannan/100007571/ted-kennedy-was-wrong-about-most-things-but-he-was-a-great-parliamentarian/

Centurion1

08-26-2009, 14:52

While i may personally not like the man, i mourn his death as an elder statesman.

Seamus Fermanagh

08-26-2009, 15:09

I said an ave for the soul of my brother knight.

RIP Edward Moore Kennedy

drone

08-26-2009, 15:56

Haven't read the news, I imagine we are in for a formal State viewing. :rolleyes:

Backroom rules on dead people prevent me from commenting further.

Don Corleone

08-26-2009, 16:11

I didn't know he was a Knight. Not sure how that changes my opinion of him....

I think he was an idealist who did what he believed was right and fought for that for a good portion of his life, and for that, should be honored, regardless of how correct I believe he was on the issues themselves.

I also think he was a deeply flawed individual with grave weaknesses, and those should not be glazed over in a rush to canonize him.

And as with the the departure of any human soul, I wish him peace and God's mercy and pray for his immortal soul.

seireikhaan

08-26-2009, 16:16

Rest in peace, Mr. Kennedy. May your family find solace in what is undoubtedly a mournful time.

Hax

08-26-2009, 16:50

Strength to the family.

A shame to see a great man pass away.

Kralizec

08-26-2009, 17:05

Rest in Peace.

penguinking

08-26-2009, 19:30

A great man, he worked tirelessly for human rights and justice, and the nation will truly miss him. :bow:

Devastatin Dave

08-26-2009, 20:04

We should make his liver a national monument.

HopAlongBunny

08-26-2009, 23:00

RIP Mr. Kennedy :bow:

Don Corleone

08-27-2009, 02:08

KarlXII

08-27-2009, 04:28

The last of a dynasty.....

RIP.

lars573

08-27-2009, 04:47

Far from it. You realize the Govenator is technically a Kennedy. And one of Ted's sons is a serving representative from Rhode Island.

Banquo's Ghost

08-27-2009, 07:46

Would it be inappropriate to start another thread talking about the bizarre political wranglings to appoint his successor (of which, the late Senator himself was an active part)? It's all over the local news here in New England.

It will be fine to discuss that issue, so long as any controversies directly attributable to Senator Kennedy himself are waived until after his funeral.

Clearly, Senator Kennedy had a significant influence on Ireland, which ought to be acknowledged with both thanks and regret for his journey. The discussion must however, wait a while.

He will be missed. RIP.

Tribesman

08-27-2009, 10:37

I didn't know he was a Knight
Its from the time when the politics of America were full of Kennedys , the years of the Court of Camelot and the Lady in the Lake.

Crazed Rabbit

09-03-2009, 06:10

Well he's buried now.

I could never respect that...'man' after he drove a woman into a river and left her to die several hours after the crash, trapped in the underwater car, breathing from an air pocket. Instead of even calling the police or someone, anyone, he left and went about trying to cover his trail.

A pathetic, selfish, coward. I'll be honest; my sense of justice would be disturbed if he rested in peace right now.

And then he went on to offer to aid and abet the Soviet Union (http://www.forbes.com/2009/08/27/ted-kennedy-soviet-union-ronald-reagan-opinions-columnists-peter-robinson.html) in order to make things difficult for Reagan:

Picking his way through the Soviet archives that Boris Yeltsin had just thrown open, in 1991 Tim Sebastian, a reporter for the London Times, came across an arresting memorandum. Composed in 1983 by Victor Chebrikov, the top man at the KGB, the memorandum was addressed to Yuri Andropov, the top man in the entire USSR. The subject: Sen. Edward Kennedy.

"On 9-10 May of this year," the May 14 memorandum explained, "Sen. Edward Kennedy's close friend and trusted confidant [John] Tunney was in Moscow." (Tunney was Kennedy's law school roommate and a former Democratic senator from California.) "The senator charged Tunney to convey the following message, through confidential contacts, to the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Y. Andropov."

Kennedy's message was simple. He proposed an unabashed quid pro quo. Kennedy would lend Andropov a hand in dealing with President Reagan. In return, the Soviet leader would lend the Democratic Party a hand in challenging Reagan in the 1984 presidential election.

CR

Xiahou

09-03-2009, 07:25

Vladimir

09-03-2009, 13:27

Can I dance on his grave yet or is it too soon?

I suppose the "joke" comments were a coping mechanism. He did suffer because of it, however, I don't think he suffered enough.

drone

09-03-2009, 15:46

Can I dance on his grave yet or is it too soon?

Probably too soon. Help out the ANC landscapers and let the grass on top reset their roots first.

Strike For The South

09-03-2009, 15:52

My shotgun has killed less people than Ted Kennedys car.

There I said it and now I bow out of this thread.

ICantSpellDawg

09-04-2009, 00:46

He was a jerk who is now a part of history because he had popular brothers. Never liked him anyway.

He barely got a page, that's how you know he sucked. On tuesdays I not only insult the dead, but I fight corpses as well, i'll be here all week.

Major Robert Dump

09-04-2009, 03:17

According to Chris Matthews, Kennedy passed the torch to Obama and now Obama is the last brother. Seriously

Kadagar_AV

09-04-2009, 03:31

I could never respect that...'man' after he drove a woman into a river and left her to die several hours after the crash, trapped in the underwater car, breathing from an air pocket. Instead of even calling the police or someone, anyone, he left and went about trying to cover his trail.

is this true?

Crazed Rabbit

09-04-2009, 04:33

Yes it is; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Kennedy_Chappaquiddick_incident

It looked as if she were holding herself up to get a last breath of air. It was a consciously assumed position. ... She didn't drown. She died of suffocation in her own air void. It took her at least three or four hours to die. I could have had her out of that car twenty-five minutes after I got the call. But he [Ted Kennedy] didn't call.
— diver John Farrar, Inquest into the Death of Mary Jo Kopechne, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Edgartown District Court. New York: EVR Productions, 1970.

CR

Seamus Fermanagh

09-04-2009, 13:40

According to Chris Matthews, Kennedy passed the torch to Obama and now Obama is the last brother. Seriously

He really did, in a political sense.

Kennedy's early endorsement of Obama and his very active support of the Obama candidacy were key early components of Obama's success. Kennedy did not side-step while waiting for the primary results as did so many, he came out for Obama and put his connections to work on his behalf at a crucial phase of the campaign. Following that endorsement, Obama was pulled progressively further and further ahead of Clinton.

I also think that Kennedy did see, in Obama, a political figure who would continue the fight for a number of issues about which Kennedy had very specific objectives. Obama campaigned as center-left (which is fairly close to the base views of a goodly percentage of the electorate), and has followed a center-left approach on legislative issues during his term thus far, but his executive orders and foreign policy efforts have been much closer to the left wing side of the spectrum.

So, however silly Matthews is being on one level -- and he's prone to such silliness in phrasing -- there is a grain of truth to what he says.

Kadagar_AV

09-04-2009, 14:42

Still, he left her to die?

I dont care what else he might have done... a man who leaves a woman like that....

Centurion1

09-05-2009, 17:41

^ which is why he never had a strong case to run for president.

Lemur

09-05-2009, 18:54

Watching the Kennedys from afar, it always seemed like a version of The Godfather in which Sonny and Michael died early, and Fredo took over, with predictable results. Very sad.

KukriKhan

09-06-2009, 16:50

Watching the Kennedys from afar, it always seemed like a version of The Godfather in which Sonny and Michael died early, and Fredo took over, with predictable results. Very sad.

I never thought of it that way, but: yeah, astute observation.

I grew up in a "Kennedys are all Saints on Earth" household. Mom and Dad refused to believe the Kopechne story, insisting it was some kinda royalist/republican plot to smear the family. They died before the other stories of John F & Bobbie's sins became known. Had they not, those stories would surely have done it.

Chappaquiddick aside (and that's a huge aside) I admired Ted the politico for basic honesty. You knew where he stood, and didn't do much pandering for votes - 'course he had reelection confidently wrapped up all the time, so could afford to be forthright about his views and goals. I get the feeling that today's pollies don't bother with such trivialities as views or goals. Throw enough cash their way and they'll do anyone's bidding.

Aemilius Paulus

09-06-2009, 19:04

And then he went on to offer to aid and abet the Soviet Union (http://www.forbes.com/2009/08/27/ted-kennedy-soviet-union-ronald-reagan-opinions-columnists-peter-robinson.html) in order to make things difficult for Reagan
I would be just as glad to dance on his grave, but only when my slander is justified. After reading that article, from a source biased towards the right as Forbes is, I would not particularly trust it to convey the truth. Especially when they re-affirmed that USSR was "an evil empire". I mean, sure, there is arguments for that. But the statements reeks of naivety, propaganda, hypocrisy and such. Not something I would put in a serious magazine.

What was US? It had evils of its own. Racism is one of them, not something that was stoked in USSR. Sure, we had ethnicities we did not like. But did we do anything notable about it? No. Stalin was notorious for his murders, but as I like to say, he was an "equal-opportunity oppressor/executioner". He killed those he deemed as rebellious, whether that was the reality or not. That did not make any better, but still, the truth is truth.

To call anything pure evil, especially an entire conglomerate of nations as large as USSR is strikingly juvenile behaviour. Even to declare Nazi Germany as "evil" is most certainly a brash thing to say, as there are far too many people, and even if what the country did was atrocious, that says nothing about it as a whole - given the right leader, perhaps even at a favourable time (time may even not be as necessary), any country could have carried out something similar to the Holocaust. And many did. Genocides are uncounted in quantity.

Rhyfelwyr

09-06-2009, 19:20

Not to mention he was one of those Americans that like to think they're Irish and gave support to the likes of the IRA. Never mind connections with Gaddafi or the PLO when a brother of the leader of the free world funds those :daisy:

So he supported terrorists and let a women drown in the bottom of a lake... yeah, top guy. :2thumbsup:

Aemilius Paulus

09-06-2009, 21:07

Rhyfelwyr

09-06-2009, 22:13

More hypocrisy, IMHO. Every American leader supported "terrorists" at one point or another. Especially Reagan: see Reagan Doctrine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reagan_Doctrine). The Taliban too was supported, most prominently, including Osama Bin Laden. America has created the very evil that attacked it.

These things happen when two superpowers are striving for dominance though. The only reasoning behind the decisions of certain Americans to fund the IRA seems to be they had a great-great-grandad called Paddy and decided they had something in common with the 'freedom fighters' oppressed by the British. The most ironic thing is a lot of the Americans that think they are Irish are in fact of Ulster-Scots and not Irish descent.

Anyway, supporting the Taliban was the usual global influence thing, not nice but that's how the big powers do things. With the IRA though it was completely pointless, they were supporting a terrorist campaign against their allies, with certain branches of the terrorists like the OIRA even stating that they take orders from Moscow!

Aemilius Paulus

09-06-2009, 22:24

These things happen when two superpowers are striving for dominance though. The only reasoning behind the decisions of certain Americans to fund the IRA seems to be they had a great-great-grandad called Paddy and decided they had something in common with the 'freedom fighters' oppressed by the British. The most ironic thing is a lot of the Americans that think they are Irish are in fact of Ulster-Scots and not Irish descent.

Anyway, supporting the Taliban was the usual global influence thing, not nice but that's how the big powers do things. With the IRA though it was completely pointless, they were supporting a terrorist campaign against their allies, with certain branches of the terrorists like the OIRA even stating that they take orders from Moscow!
Yeah, you have a point. Well, stupidity I suppose... That and misplaced nationalism. Really imbecilic it was though. Even if the Micks were morally right, I would rather be friends with an entity the likes of UK, and not a poor, uninfluencial start-up such as Ireland.

Xiahou

09-07-2009, 02:42

More hypocrisy, IMHO. Every American leader supported "terrorists" at one point or another. Especially Reagan: see Reagan Doctrine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reagan_Doctrine). The Taliban too was supported, most prominently, including Osama Bin Laden. America has created the very evil that attacked it.

At that time, the Taliban were portrayed as gallant "freedom fighters" back then - even Reagan called them exactly that. Or all those Hollywood films featuring them. Hehe, I do not think I even remember any Soviet propaganda that was as bad... Taliban was never subtle about what it stood for: a totalitarian Muslim-extremist theocracy which enslaved all women and kept the men in fear with violence. Really, very few regimes were as negative in the beginning in the Western eyes.That's a little bit of an overstatement. The US supported many warlords and resistance groups during the Soviet invasion- but the Taliban didn't even exist yet. Further, it wasn't just a US enterprise, many countries were interested in seeing the Soviets fail. That's not to say you don't have some shred of a point there, but you're definitely overstating it.

Evil_Maniac From Mars

09-07-2009, 04:02

Sure, we had ethnicities we did not like. But did we do anything notable about it? No. Stalin was notorious for his murders, but as I like to say, he was an "equal-opportunity oppressor/executioner".

Firstly, not we. You were born after the USSR fell, and you should be damned glad you did. Secondly, that's just not true. Stalin loved his minorities. Or, rather, loved to oppress them. Why do you think he is so much more hated in some places than others? Stalin was a xenophobe, and he did a lot more than anyone in America.

He killed those he deemed as rebellious, whether that was the reality or not. That did not make any better, but still, the truth is truth.

Ironic that they usually turned out to be ethnicities he disliked then. :laugh4:

To call anything pure evil, especially an entire conglomerate of nations as large as USSR is strikingly juvenile behaviour. Even to declare Nazi Germany as "evil" is most certainly a brash thing to say, as there are far too many people, and even if what the country did was atrocious, that says nothing about it as a whole - given the right leader, perhaps even at a favourable time (time may even not be as necessary), any country could have carried out something similar to the Holocaust. And many did. Genocides are uncounted in quantity.

It is true that no country was ever completely black or white, but some were certainly more evil than others. On a comparitive basis, the USSR was certainly much worse than America.

Aemilius Paulus

09-07-2009, 04:28

That's not to say you don't have some shred of a point there, but you're definitely overstating it.
:shrug: I was never much of a subtle debater, nor do I particularly favour litotes. Overstatement is normally my first technique, which affects only the less-informed. Since I seemed to have stumbled on a wiser crowd, it is now necessary for me to switch tactics.

Firstly, not we. You were born after the USSR fell, and you should be damned glad you did.
I am a Russian, and USSR was Russian history. I consider that as my own. And you have no idea when I was born, any more than you know how old ACIN is.

Ironic that they usually turned out to be ethnicities he disliked then. :laugh4:
Call Stalin many things, but he was not a rabid racist a la Hitler. As the vast majority people of his (and our) time, he may have disliked certain minorities, but that was it. Or perhaps he even hated some, but from a political aspect, he certainly was a not that. And before you say Ukraine (keeping in mind my father is a Ukrainian), that was not minority oppression. Ukrainians are a majority in their own country, they were subjugated peoples altogether too predisposed towards rebellion, particularly in the form of clandestine partisan activities. His treatment of Ukrainians was not founded on prejudice, racism, pseudo-science, etc, but on political realities.

Ukrainians were not a historically ill-treated, and small-numbered community. That did not make them any different, but to call them as an ethnicity in the context of modern "racism/discrimination" concept is incorrect, for Ukrainians are not a single group of people, but a confluence of hundreds of minor groups. Stating Ukrainians are a single ethnic body is no different from declaring all French are of the same ethnicity or insisting that Russians are all a single group of people. In reality, the number of nuances is immense. A Ukrainian is citizen of Ukraine, and not so much a single coherent-in-any-manner collection of persons. To target a "Ukrainian" is to target a national of a specific political entity, and not an ethnic group.

Like any people proud or even merely mindful of their heritage, they yearned for independence, and Stalin, from a perverse, evil, but at the same time somewhat practical-for-USSR perspective, was correct to treat them as such. Since, unfortunately, he did not have the option of treating Ukrainians liberally for a smooth integration and allowing autonomy, Stalin resorted to the only other option - mass murder to force dread and fear through all strata of the society. Classic example of the totalitarian manner of dealing with internal dissent.

It is true that no country was ever completely black or white, but some were certainly more evil than others. On a comparitive basis, the USSR was certainly much worse than America.
In this I absolutely agree with you. But the underlined is all that I meant to convey through my previous posts. The rest is what I deemed as granted. To argue that USSR was no more evil than US is farce, and takes considerable academic insolence.

Evil_Maniac From Mars

09-07-2009, 04:38

I am a Russian, and USSR was Russian history. I consider that as my own. And you have no idea when I was born, any more than you know how old ACIN is.

Yes, I do, since you mentioned this last time we discussed the topic.

Call Stalin many things, but he was not a rabid racist a la Hitler.

No, he wasn't. But he was a xenophobe, and he did kill people because he didn't like their ethnicities. It's true he often did this for "security concerns", but in reality, "security concerns" in the majority of cases were trumped up charges, or excuses, used to oppress and murder people. Nothing more.

Aemilius Paulus

09-07-2009, 05:19

No, he wasn't. But he was a xenophobe, and he did kill people because he didn't like their ethnicities. It's true he often did this for "security concerns", but in reality, "security concerns" in the majority of cases were trumped up charges, or excuses, used to oppress and murder people. Nothing more.
Hmm, interesting. No really, I am not being sarcastic. What were those ethnicities then? I doubt you can make a strong case for Ukrainians. They were mass-murdered with little discrimination - simply for the dread factor, to force others to keep their heads down and lips sealed.