I'm not saying I agree with this but a different point of view can be useful when almost everyone else is saying the same things:
http://www.slate.com/id/2226780/?from=rss
This was prompted by the 'special edition' Meet the Press on Sunday which was essentially a tribute to dead Ted Kennedy instead of some debate on the economy or healthcare which I was expecting.
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I would agree with Hitchens that Kennedy was blessed with family privilege and prestige. I also don’t think anyone could deny that Edward won the senate seat in 1962 because he was a Kennedy. But, as usually, Hitchens over reaches in his criticisms showing his bias toward anyone but himself (“family coat-tailing, carpet bagging, fascist sympathies, bootlegging, assassinating, drug addictions”). I thought the title was “assessing the media version of the Kennedy “legacy”. Not, “The Kennedys: Building an American Camelot on Crime and Beauty”. I too am a little sick of seeing so much coverage of the late senator, but I cannot think of one broadcast, even The Today Show, which failed to mention Chappaquiddick or the early 1990s drinking/rape incident with his nephew, or the failed marriage. Kennedy never ran his campaign on infallibility or moral superiority. Coming from aristocracy he championed democracy and equality. His life appears to be a series of mistakes followed by corrections (kicked out of Harvard-joins military-returns to Harvard: Chappaquiddick, alcoholism, divorce-new marriage, sobriety, dedicated legislator). If anything, all this reporting can show that there can be redemption from the past with a good work ethic in the future and it can give a historical context to the fights for healthcare, voting policies, women’s rights, and affirmative action.
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