Senator Edward Kennedy

What’s Wrong With This Picture?

The "liberal lion of the Senate," Edward Kennedy, has died of brain cancer according to his office’s press release. He was 77.

His three older brothers, all of whom had presidential aspirations, did not overshadow the senior Massachusetts Senator, known as Teddy. He was the third longest serving member of the senior legislative body; having been elected at the minimum legal age of 30 in a special election in 1962, filling out his brother’s term and then being reelected eight more times.

The sons of Joseph and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy: Ted’s oldest brother, Joseph Jr. was selected early on by his father to be President, but was killed in an Army bomber during World War II. John became President in 1960 after serving as a member of the House of Representatives and twice elected to the Senate and was assassinated Nov. 22, 1963 in Dallas, Texas. Ted’s third brother, Robert was Attorney General for President Kennedy and after his death, Lyndon Johnson, until he was elected Senator from New York in 1964. Bobby, as he was known, entered the 1968 Democratic Presidential nomination campaign and made a strong showing heading into the Chicago Convention when he was also assassinated after winning the California primary, June 5, 1968.

Ted Kennedy’s higher political ambitions came to an end when he was involved in a fatal car crash at Chappaquiddick Island July 18, 1969, that killed Mary Jo Kopechne, a former staffer for Robert Kennedy.

He was a champion of liberal causes and especially health care.

So what’s wrong with this picture?

Kennedy was not my political hero, but one has to recognize his long service to his state in acknowledge his work for the nation.

The above picture was taken during his visit to Albuquerque in support of fellow Illinois Senator Barack Obama before the February 2008 New Mexico Democratic Caucus.