Kathryn Jean Lopez brings the love for the dying Ted Kennedy:
It’s funny because Chappaquiddick! Yeah, sure, that was like forty years ago, but still.
Look, KLo, if you’re going to snark on Teddy, go with Dave Weigel, for the win:
They should bring Carter onstage and refuse to shake hands, for old time’s sake.
Now that’s good stuff.
Yup, it was 39 years ago. Mary Jo Kopechne would have been 68 this year. Except for the fact, of course, that a driver who had been drinking killed her – a driver who in my opinion and many others was never really held to account for his actions.
And therefore, it’s classy for KLo to use Kopechne’s death as a cheap partisan joke?
It seems possible (although not certain) that the death of Mary Jo Kopechne was yet another example of how the wealthy and well-connected aren’t held accountable to the law in at all the way ordinary citizens are.
And if someone were to say something like, “whatever good Kennedy has done, the shadow cast by Kopechne’s death should be included in any assessment of Kennedy’s life,” I’d agree with that.
But I don’t think the intent or effect of how Republicans use Kopechne’s memory is to be nuanced, or balanced; and I don’t the constant Chappaquiddick jokes honor Kopechne’s life or memory.
And therefore, it’s classy for KLo to use Kopechne’s death as a cheap partisan joke?
No. But every time I see Ted Kennedy cheered it makes me sick.
It seems possible (although not certain) that the death of Mary Jo Kopechne was yet another example of how the wealthy and well-connected aren’t held accountable to the law in at all the way ordinary citizens are.
I was living in Massachusetts at the time, having been born and raised there, and I’ve done some reading since. Certain? Hell, I’d bet the house on it.
And if someone were to say something like, “whatever good Kennedy has done, the shadow cast by Kopechne’s death should be included in any assessment of Kennedy’s life,” I’d agree with that.
Fair enough.
But I don’t think the intent or effect of how Republicans use Kopechne’s memory is to be nuanced, or balanced; and I don’t the constant Chappaquiddick jokes honor Kopechne’s life or memory.
Some individuals have used it, but I’m not sure that I’d say that Republicans use that at all as a group. In accordance with the second paragraph of your comment probably too many of them have their own skeletons in the closet. In fact, I don’t think it gets brought up enough. The man should have been barred from his Senate seat (which the Senate has the power to do), and continuing to send him there is a shame to the electorate of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, a body I spent some time being a member of.
Jokes about Chappaquiddick don’t do her much honor, but glossing over it or forgetting about it would be even worse; unfortunately, jokes are about all we have these days. More’s the pity.
I didn’t mean elected Republican officials; I meant more the Republican activist base, which (from what I’ve read) does joke about Chappaquiddick quite a lot. (Of course, that doesn’t mean that 100% of individuals tell such jokes).
I don’t agree with the idea of barring Kennedy from his Senate seat, because that would take away the right of Massachusetts voters to elect who they want to elect. (Kopechne’s death did, in all likelihood, prevent Kennedy from becoming President.)
I don’t agree with the idea of barring Kennedy from his Senate seat, because that would take away the right of Massachusetts voters to elect who they want to elect.
Ever heard of a man named Adam Powell?
Yes, I have. The Supreme Court ruled that it was unconstitutional for Powell to be excluded from the House, because Harlem voters had the right to elect Powell if they wanted to. So Powell’s example supports my position.
True. I’m not saying that Kennedy wouldn’t have ended up right back in his seat. But it would have at least put the Senate on the record on the matter. And they could have stripped him of his Committee assignments.
I don’t approve of the Senate engaging in an action they know is unconstitutional in order to be “on record.” They have constitutional ways of being “on record” if they want to, such as passing a statement.
There already exists a criminal code for punishing criminal acts. You want to substitute congressional maneuvering; but the primary people punished by what you suggest are the voters of Massachusetts. And the primary people helped by what you suggest would not be Kopechne or her family; they would be partisan conservatives looking for ways to weaken elected officials they disagree with. So no, I’m not going for that.
What I would have liked to see Congress do is to try and pass some legislation to make it harder for the wealthy and connected to get sweetheart treatment when they come under suspicion of breaking the law. That would have been meaningful.
What I would have liked to see Congress do is to try and pass some legislation to make it harder for the wealthy and connected to get sweetheart treatment when they come under suspicion of breaking the law. That would have been meaningful.
Yup. Kennedy’s actions on that night were reprehensible — everyone can agree with that. And if, like KLo, you believe in God, then you believe he’s soon going to have to account for that.
And if you have class, you judge not, lest you be judged.
As Brandon Berg points out on his blog, I was mistaken when I said that expelling Kennedy would have been unconstitutional; the Constitution specifically allows for the expelling of members, given a two-thirds vote.
What would be unconstitutional (if I’m not mistaken again – which I may be, since I haven’t read the decision) would be then to exclude that person from being re-elected to Congress. (This is what Congress did with Adam Powell, which the Supreme Court then overruled).
Yeah, it might not have been fair to the people of the Commonwealth, but it would have been Constitutional. And even if the Senate had not wanted to go that far, they could still have made him an institutional pariah by stripping him of any committee chairmanships (and even memberships). But no, he was still viewed as not just fit to be a member, but a leader.
We will all be judged. And to paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, I tremble when I consider my sins that I will be judged for. But what Matthew quotes Jesus as saying in Chapter 7 of his book in the Bible is not that we should never evaluate other peoples’ actions, but that we should be aware that we ourselves will be judged on the same basis as we judge other people, and that any punishment we hand out we will ourselves suffer for the same offenses.
Only Mary Jo, Ted Kennedy and God know what happened that night. And I suspect that Ted’s probably not all that clear on it, since (I’m betting) he was drunk at the time. But what I do know is that he never stood up and took responsibility and faced the consequences for it; instead, he used his considerable money and power and name to duck it as much as possible. His fellow Senators could have done something about that. They could have at least registered their disapproval with any of a number of sanctions. They failed.
That’s not how I read it. It doesn’t say “for the same offenses”. It says “judge not”, or you will be punished for it. Leave the judging to God.
I agree it’s not a prohibition on evaluating other people’s actions. The object of the verb “judge” in the “lest” clause is “you”. It is an injunction against judging people, not their actions. “You are a bad person” is enjoined. “You did a bad thing” is not.
“Judge” carried a different connotation than it does now. It initially carried the implication of condemning – as in, don’t condemn others. So yeah, it is not true that you shouldn’t evaluate people’s actions. That would be stupid.
However, when you say,
… comes perilously close to suggesting that it’s okay to judge, even condemn people, so long as we acknowledge in the back of our minds the bare fact that we will face Judgment too*. That’s a veeeery (small-l) liberal way of interpreting the text. I think it’s fairly obvious from the Gospels that Jesus wanted us to be humble, not assume the worst of people, and give them second chances in this world as well.
Not having known him myself, I think this is essentially what Jesus meant.
*I am, of course, speaking hypothetically, as I am no longer a practicing Christian. I, however, do remain interested in religions in general.