I wasn't planning to watch his funeral, but caught the start of the proceedings at Camillo's Barbershop in Tenleytown. All the barbers there - a great American melting pot of Italians, Filipinos, Salvadorans, Thai, and Korean men and women - were rapt in attention. The only dude not paying attention was some loudmouthed Washingtonian talking about his vacation and one of his clients, a Chinese manufacturing group. After my haircut I rushed home to catch the rest of the ceremony.
It was a beautiful service, equal parts celebratory and sad. I'm not a big opera fan, an actual anti-fan, but was undone by Placido Domingo (with America's official cellist, Yo-Yo Ma, accompanying him; who is our second-best cellist? I fear the gap between one and two is huge!). Got weepy then.
For those scoring at home I was also a puddle after: Teddy II's story about climbing the hill shortly after being fitted with a prosthetic leg (tearing up as I type this in fact); when one of the commentators read Jackie Onasis's letter to the Senator after he stood in for his assassinated brother and gave Caroline Kennedy away at her wedding; after Patrick Kennedy talked about his dad holding a cold compress to his head until he fell asleep; and finally when his grand kids, nieces and nephews offered prayers to Kennedy's political beliefs and fights.
I thought Obama's eulogy was great, too. He looked very presidential and like a regular guy mourning a good friend throughout the service. It was also nice to see President Carter, a rival of Kennedy's, in the front row with the Obama. And of course, I have to take a shot at Bush, who looked like a squirming frat boy delayed from going to a keg party by a 'stupid funeral my dad said I HAVE to go to.' What an idiot.
To many, Kennedy was a cartoonish caricature of a liberal but his funeral summed up that he was a man. A man who took his responsibilities to his family and his country seriously. He wasn't perfect, and had some serious pitfalls, but in general he stepped up for his kids, his extended family, and politically - for 50 years in the trenches and tedium of passing legislation - Kennedy stepped up for the underrepresented, the poor, the neglected, the public interest.
Growing up in Jesse Helms' North Carolina, you knew that every two years any Democrat running for office would be featured on a billboard, TV ad, and flyer next to an image of Ted Kennedy. It didn't matter if you were a conservative like Robert Morgan, a serious and successful and forward-thinking moderate like Jim Hunt, or a reformist liberal like Nick Galifinakis, you were negatively compared to Kennedy. And it usually worked.
How sad that in my home state, being compared to someone who's life work revolved around access to health care, and whose legacy includes increasing the minimum wage, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the National Cancer Center, and voting rights, was a liability.
But what do you expect from folks like Helms. Ted Kennedy, and the entire Kennedy family, was in politics for the right reason - to make the country better, to make sure that every American was given his or her birthright, the American birthright of an opportunity. Jesse Helms got into politics mainly for two reasons: cut taxes for rich people, and thwart the civil rights movement.
Sadly, many Republicans have similar motivations, especially about slashing the size of the federal government and repealing the New Deal. I remember when I was in Florida and Representative Connie Mack decided to run for Senate. In an interview he indicated the reason he first ran for Congress was to relax federal oversight of the banking industry, or Rep. Tom Coburn telling audiences two years ago that, if elected, two of his top priorities for the U.S. Senate would be a constitutional ban on abortion and cutting the size of government by 50 percent (ignoring that unless you slash defense spending or cut Social Security in half you can never ever do that).
Not exactly lofty goals, but then again we are talking about right-wing nuts here.
Finally, as sad as it was to see Kennedy pass, the silver lining is that the week offered a spirited display - and defense of - liberalism. The New Deal, and liberalism, believes that government has a moral obligation to help those less fortunate achieve the American dream. Whether we're talking about health care and Social Security, federally-insured banking, mortgages, student loans, etc. government has to step in.
And besides doing things that the private sector can't or wouldn't do - provide for the common defense, build highways, provide rural electrification, among many examples - government is also better at democratizing capital. The democratizing of
money is the most exalted goal of liberalism, something the free market does not do effectively.
Unregulated free markets lead to the hoarding of wealth - it's human nature, but extreme human nature for the wealthy to hoard their money - and government spending - on tanks, roads, health care, the environment, etc. - spreads it around.
That's why liberalism is better than any alternative, and why Kennedy's legacy is so vivid and substantial.
But the funeral of Ted Kennedy showed that even if you removed the politics from his life, he was still a substantive guy who lovingly served his family and friends.
Long live Ted Kennedy, the Kennedy family, and the ideals they personified personally and politically.
A Few More SHORT Thoughts
- Perhaps one reason conservatives like Helms or Limbaugh hated Ted Kennedy was that he was not a hypocrite. Unlike folks like Mark Sanford, for instance, Kennedy never claimed to be Mr. Family Values, and though he was a womanizer for a time he stepped up for his kids and extended family;
- Let's hope the proud reminders of Kennedy's and liberalism's accomplishments the last week will temper the coverage of the anti-health care nuts swamping town hall meetings, and hopefully spur folks who put Obama in office to vocally push back;
- I remember my mom crying during Robert Kennedy's funeral in 1968, and yesterday Evan got to watch me cry at Ted Kennedy's (Ariadne was at a birthday party);
- I probably lobbied Kennedy twice in my years in DC - he was always a good vote so we didn't need to bug him much - but still got a thrill whenever I saw him in the halls. So much history - tragic and triumphant - in one dude;
- Some of you know this already, but the first time I ever voted was for Ted Kennedy for president. Even though I wasn't 18 at the time, in March 1980, since I was eligible to vote in November I was allowed to vote in the NC Democratic primary. Kennedy was swamped by President Carter in the primary, and the next day my parents and I 'kind' of made the paper. Carter won our precinct 120 or something to 3, the votes of me, my mom and my dad;
4 comments:
Excellent post Athan, very moving. I also quite like the story about 1980 and what I imagine was one of your first press hits.
I also said Stephen Strasburg is the next Mark Prior, and I hope I mean that in the "he'll be a prodigy and go 18-6 in his first full season," not the "he'll have a manager who works him and his fellow pitchers on the staff too hard and, after two promising seasons, he will be plagued by injuries for the rest of his career and have to be signed to a pathetic minor league contract with the San Diego Padres."
I hear you on Prior. Overwork was the problem with him.
I really liked this post. Growing up in Utah, 'liberal' was almost a dirty word. Right up there with 'damn environmentalist.' I spent much of the weekend driving and listening to the tributes an retrospectives on NPR, it was really great to hear people stand up for 'liberalism' and one of it's great champions.
on a related note... I un-friended two people on facebook, who I have known since childhood, because of the ignorant and idiotic things they posted about Ted Kennedy. I didn't know I cared that much.
Great to know you read one of my posts, too.
Post a Comment