Rest in Peace Teddy

It might seem hard to understand how someone that has never met someone could feel such a great loss when that person passes away. Teddy Kennedy wasn’t just a senator or the lion of the congress that many news agencies have coined him to be. He was bigger than life even with the tragic legacy of his brothers as his shield and the love of the people that returned him to his office every six years for almost five decades. He was a simple man that just loved life and loved people and that was the ultimate source that made him a great man.

I spent the weekend watching the wake and celebration of his life at the JFK Library, the Mass in Boston, and eventually the burial in Arlington National Cemetery and I still can’t personally shake the loss of this man that some would call just another politician. I gave my own personal account of what he did for my father and my family without a second thought and I wonder how many other lives he touched? From the families that had loved ones on the planes that were hijacked on September 11th to people not even in his district he reached out to in order to heal their pain. Not just once but over and over again. Calling all of the families and loved ones personally to let them know that THEY were not forgotten. Their loved one was not forgotten. In doing so he formed a bond with the people and it was a bond that brought him closer to them as if he were family. It’s something that Teddy did his entire life.

His passing was like losing a father figure or the favorite uncle that you wished you had growing up. Teddy was bigger than life but he would be just as comfortable in a soup kitchen with homeless people as he would be dining at the Ritz. How anyone endures the loss of two of his brothers by assassination is beyond my personal comprehension and I‘m sure yours as well. How you lead a family and not implode after those events personally is a testament to his strength and spirit as a man and to his faith in God. Most people would have coward in fear and yet Teddy spent all of the days of his life in public service and in doing so sent a message to America, we can never give up if we believe our cause to be true. He carried the torch forward and honorably in the place of his three brothers.

My heart goes out to his family but especially to the love of his life Vickie. Without her, he would have been just another politician and the Kennedy legacy would have died. Yes, he could have still done great things but his mission would not be the same without her to heal him so he could help so many others. She saved him and he in turn saved countless others.

Rest in peace and you will be in our prayers Teddy.

Papamoka

Teddy Kennedy and Liberal Ideology

Picture courtesy of Stephan Savoia / AP

With the sad news that Senator Teddy Kennedy is ill, I offer my personal prayers to him, his wife, and his children. I personally don’t know what he will have to go through but I’m sure he will get the best care available. After all he is in and from the so called Mecca of medical science research state. Something he was instrumental in helping to create in the Bay State.

If there is a human medical condition that needed treatment then it was his liberal ideology that worked the government channels over the decades to get the groundwork started in research and eventual treatment. While others were working on bridges to nowhere he was working on the highways of advanced medical science projects here in Massachusetts. Something he spent a lifetime in public service for not just America but the world.

Over at MSNBC they have this on the Senators condition…

NBC News and news services
updated 4:27 p.m. ET, Tues., May. 20, 2008

BOSTON - A cancerous brain tumor caused the seizure Sen. Edward M. Kennedy suffered over the weekend, doctors said Tuesday in a grim diagnosis for one of American politics' most enduring figures.

The Massachusetts Democrat has a malignant glioma in the left parietal-lobe, according to doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital, where Kennedy, 76, has been undergoing tests since Saturday after having a seizure at his Cape Cod home.

The usual course of treatment includes combinations of radiation and chemotherapy, but Kennedy's treatment will be decided after more tests. - MSNBC

If you have been getting all your news on the Senators condition from television then hold that thought for a second and read on. Senator Kennedy is not dead! He isn’t in a coma or incoherent and out of touch with his faculties. Yes, he has a brain tumor but he’s probably had it for some time now and has been functioning pretty damn well for a 76 year old man. I give his beautiful wife Victoria the credit for his amazing health up to this point and she deserves a ton of credit for that. Behind every great man is a greater woman telling him to knock off the bad boy behavior. To his credit he listened to her. Love is grand like that and with her help he has accomplished so much more than he could have without her.

While I understand that the Senator is sick the fact remains that he is not dead! He has cancer and that is not a death sentence as much as it was even ten years ago. Yes he will have to slow down his schedule but he should have done that ten years ago. Kennedy’s, you can’t talk to them at any age to ever slow down and I’m sure Victoria has been telling him that fact for years and that he can’t be everywhere for everyone all the time. Have you ever known a Kennedy to not be there for anyone?

Back years ago Senator Kennedy helped my father when he was up against a wall of Pentagon double speak. Dad was a proud Veteran of WWII and Korea, a Purple Heart Veteran, a highly decorated man that wanted to just display his medals in a case to pass on to his sons. He had lost his medals in the course of raising seven children for service to his nation. Creating future taxpayers for his nation post war was a challenge and if you know how large families are, stuff just disappears. Everywhere and everyone in the military that Dad wrote to turned up with negative replies for help or no reply at all. At the insistence of his wife, my mother, he contacted Senator Kennedy and thought he would never see his medals ever again. Less than a month later Dad received a box in the mail from Senator Kennedy’s office with all of the medals and ribbons he received during all of his service time. That was the first time that I saw my father cry in front of me, the second was my mothers funeral.

My family lived on a truck driver industry paycheck and had no political influence and yet with this one simple act of kindness or desire to be a true public servant he won the hearts and minds of seven children that are now adults. Public service isn’t always about the big details, sometimes it just about touching one persons heart that wins a lifetime of support. We all feel compassion but Senator Kennedy is the Liberal Ideology of America.

Senator Kennedy will slow down during his treatment just as everyone else that has had cancer and the treatment that goes with it to survive it. Will he survive it? Only God knows that answer. Do I have hope for him? Yes I do! No matter what you see on the television about expected survival rates or prognosis on his chances I still come back to the fact that he is a Kennedy. Teddy Kennedy has never been someone afraid of any challenge in his life and this is just another hurdle to overcome. I wish him luck and prayers with this battle. By all means do not count him out of the political arena by a long shot, but do keep him in your thoughts and prayers. We all need those prayers in these difficult times.

Politically, as cold as it sounds, as Senator Kennedy must wind down the twilight of his years in the Senate and in his life, we must choose a standard bearer that will meet the gold standard example he has set in his lifetime of public service. In that thought process, look to Senator Kennedy to offer the wisdom he holds true to his heart. Who can carry the torch he held and propel his dreams, his brothers dreams, onto the next generation of Americans?

Get well Teddy, we love ya!

Papamoka

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