the Kennedy clan

[winterbadger]

sujata posted the result of one of the latest LJ memes, the "in the year you were born" one, in her journal. It included the following sentence:

Senator Edward Kennedy escapes injury when the car he is driving veers off a narrow bridge on Chappaquiddick Island.

The compilers of those lists have a wicked sense of irony. If Ted Kennedy had been able to run for the Democratic nomination in 1972, I think there's a very strong chance he would have been the 38th President of the United States. To say that Kennedy escaped injury at Chappaquiddick is only true in the most literal sense. I imagine that at many points since then he's wished he hadn't escaped. Which is not to take away from his distinguished career in the Senate since then, but it's got to be bitter wine to him when the thinks of the days before June 1969. Let no one watch the lives of the Kennedy family and say that the tragedy of Sophocles and Euripedes is dead.

Comments

[meepeek.livejournal.com]

It's been pointed out to me that his inability to ever run for president is what has made Ted a more forthright Senator than he would otherwise ever have been. He has less to lose than most politicians, since it's unlikely his state will ever vote him out, and since he doesn't have to worry about how it will reflect on him when he runs for president...

I find it unreal that they only mention his escaping in that meme, when the rest of that fiasco was one of the pivotal moments in his life, and potentially American history, since he was like to run/win if it hadn't happened.