Chappaquidick - The Lion of the Senate and The End of Camelot

Posted at Powerline .

I am getting to the age where I sometimes am astonished when I read of history that I remember watching on TV as a child. Astonished in that it occurred right at the time that we had such intense coverage on all TV channels about the Moon Landing. I do not associate one with the other.

Now, it may amaze some of you who live in the age of Tivo, but in northeast Indiana in 1969 there were only three broadcast channnels available. And if you had a directional antennae in a rural area, there was actually only one that was clear. To give you an idea of the nightly adventures, Dad was squarely in front of the TV judging the clarity of the picture (fine tuning was by sound), Mom was stationed at the open kitchen window shouting and your blogger here, as an only child, was up on a ladder going up the roof of the garage to turn the pipe on which the antennae was mounted with a pair of rusted-on vice grips. Using Mom's shouted directions, I would turn the pipe until I heard her shout, "Your Daddy says you went too far." Being a refrain heard my entire life, nonetheless, I would back it up a tad with hopes that I had not went too far that in that direction. Luckily, this little task became a multiple nightly occurrence only during good weather. In the winter, if John-Boy was the first program of the evening, well guess what, you are watching CBS that night.

So when I read this today, I keep in mind that a lot of people today believe that Ted Kennedy represents the best of his generation at his brand of politics. The Lion of the Senate as he stands today, unfortunately, is direct contrast to JFK. Now, if you are like most people my age (and many of our elite conservative pundits), we were at one time classical liberals who remember the politics of John Kennedy. My Dad held me on his shoulder at a political rally in Spartanburg, SC when I was a squirt. My babysitter had a husband, Heyward "Slim" Powers, who was the biggest fan of JFK and could opine on the greatness of JFK for hours. Camelot suggested of a royal family blessing a worthy country. But throughout the sixties, we lost so much as a nation as we watched three major assassinations, social unrest, and a war that we could lose only by talking it down. By the time that the events at Chappaquiddick unfolded, we were pretty numb and Camelot had quietly died without much fanfare. Only the moon landing stands out in a positive way for me.

JFK's politics on national security and the economy today would be considered very conservative because they were the politics held by people different than the people of today. People who had lived through a great world war and a depression (and had won hard-fought battles) had politics that were optimistic and 'can do.' Compare that to the politics of today where not putting a wind farm on Cape Cod is seen as enlightenment. Hell, the very idea of shooting monkeys into space would drive some quarters into apoplexy if we suggested it today. Liberal politics during the sixties changed from the politics of optimism to the politics of limitation, entitlement and envy. Ted Kennedy epitomizes this modern-day liberal politics and overlooks Chappaquiddick.

As I have said before, it is important to remember that our elected leaders are chosen from the human race and are elected by the folks that want them to represent their interests. Very few are heroes and none are worthy of deification. Unfortunately, the events at Chappaquiddick serve to remind us of a sense of family entitlement that is best left out of politics.