And then it hit me

I live in a world without Ted Kennedy. I know I wrote about this earlier, but it wasn’t until I got home that it really sank in that he’s gone. I’ve been a political junkie a long, long time. I grew up in a family of Kennedy Democrats. When I was a young Republican (still weird to say that) he was the Enemy but I was aware of how he had always been on the side of the little guy. Conservative as I was, I was still black and as such a direct beneficiary of the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act. As I got older and came to something that could be called political and intellectual maturity and left my youthful conservatism behind, I came to truly admire Ted Kennedy. Was he a flawed man? Yes, all humans are flawed--myself as much or more than anyone. But he was a true liberal who, I believe, got really serious after Bobby Kennedy’s death and the tragedy at Chappaquddick. The grown-up Ted Kennedy became a consummate legislator, a statesman in the best and truest sense of the term, and a light for liberals.

He was able to compromise and negotiate with people with whom he might otherwise disagree vehemently in order to get something done. This is an art--the very core--of politics. Kennedy could do this better than most and probably better than anyone remaining in the Senate and, as such, was spectacularly capable. We can think Kennedy for the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, Title IX and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

As I said in my earlier post, Ted Kennedy was always there just part of the background of American politics. Now there’s a hole in our national pantheon and we will likely not see his like for a long time to come.