the endurance of chappaquiddick

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this week ann coulter bitched about the "liberal indictments" on delay/scooter/abramoff/rove/etc & suggested the death of mary jo kopechne as the single political crime that most demands special investigation today. does the chappaquiddick incident still hold currency in the non-pundit masses? still revived daily by jokey demagogues like coulter, straight-faced editorialists in the wsj opinion journal, assholes on free republic and bigger assholes like david irving - does it color kennedy's reputation, to this day? is it just a cheap shot, beneath the arsenal of any honest critic? old ppl who were alive in 1969, what was the coverage of the time? has the scandal aspect waxed or waned over time? can anybody from marthas vineyard weigh in on local implications of it, how it fits into regional history and kennedy mythologizing there? on a national level, is ted still the chappaquiddick senator, an unrepetant adulterer & murderer? has the left's view of ted, advanced by jack newfield in the nation as "america's grief counselor", taken hold? would democrats gloat over vehicular homicide by a republican senator (laura bush doesnt count)? does the actual incident hold any ramifications beyond exploitable scandal? does anyone still care?

― %$#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 17:56 (twenty years ago)

http://www.illinoisfamily.org/content/img/f22737/Prickly%20City.gif

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 17:57 (twenty years ago)

does it color kennedy's reputation, to this day?

sure it does, but it doesn't really matter, since we're well past 1980.

― hstencil (hstencil), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:00 (twenty years ago)

well yeah he'll always be re-elected but since hes the public face of "liberal" democrats i think it does matter

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:01 (twenty years ago)

WHY DON'T YOU TELL US?

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:04 (twenty years ago)

i give you a B+

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:06 (twenty years ago)

would democrats gloat over vehicular homicide by a republican senator (laura bush doesnt count)?

"vehicular homicide"? sez who?

you heard a lot about this guy, right?

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:06 (twenty years ago)

xpost: sub-rjg

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:06 (twenty years ago)

well this is getting off to a nice start!

― s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:08 (twenty years ago)

i think this is a good question though... it's something i've noticed recently, maybe because coulter loves bringing it up so much.

― s1ocki (slutsky), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:08 (twenty years ago)

ohhh right haha

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:08 (twenty years ago)

i think gabbeneb is blaming me for the endurance of chappaquiddick

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:09 (twenty years ago)

"can anybody from marthas vineyard weigh in on local implications of it, how it fits into regional history and kennedy mythologizing there?"

we have all been paid off in fresh lobster meat. we are sworn to secrecy. i can tell you where harvey weinstein buries his dead though.

― scott seward (scott seward), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:09 (twenty years ago)

lotsa talk about this though:

http://www.mvgazette.com/news/2005/11/04/kennedy_land_plan.php

― scott seward (scott seward), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:12 (twenty years ago)

sorry, i think the only time it really mattered was when ted had aspirations for a national office. now it's just an old thing republicans bring up (as if they had no skeletons in their closets), which has no bearing on the people who actually vote/are represented by teddy.

― hstencil (hstencil), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:14 (twenty years ago)

well it makes for an easy dismissal of kennedy & his ideas, do you think that clinton's sexual indiscretions had no influence on his reputation since just cuz he'd already been re-elected in 96? dont you think its easier for americans to listen to someone with what they see as a clean moral slate?

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:18 (twenty years ago)

no. yes.

― u saved me (dubplatestyle), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:25 (twenty years ago)

sorry its easy to pile on rhetorical questions when youre at work asking dumb shit all day

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:27 (twenty years ago)

my answers were sincere.

― u saved me (dubplatestyle), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:28 (twenty years ago)

to be perfectly honest work is kinda slow today and i was hoping that "women of ile" thread would have exploded a bit more.

― u saved me (dubplatestyle), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:28 (twenty years ago)

would you say that hormel breakfast sausages are

a, very healthy
b, somewhat healthy
c, somewhat unhealthy
d, very unhealthy

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:28 (twenty years ago)

d. if eaten regularly.

― u saved me (dubplatestyle), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:29 (twenty years ago)

i hate my job

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:31 (twenty years ago)

people actually say "very healthy"!!!

― $#@!!, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:31 (twenty years ago)

like, moms

― $#@!@, Monday, 19 December 2005 18:32 (twenty years ago)

haha is that what you're doing these days??

― u saved me (dubplatestyle), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:32 (twenty years ago)

i just downed a hoagie (excuse me, "sub") and am washing it down with coffee, so i guess i can't get too hypocritical about these moms.

― u saved me (dubplatestyle), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:34 (twenty years ago)

though i have to say i wouldnt feed my kids any of this bullshit.

― u saved me (dubplatestyle), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:34 (twenty years ago)

"well it makes for an easy dismissal of kennedy & his ideas"

By people who would have dismissed those ideas anyway (Coulter et all) and would have found some other easy way of doing so if Chappaquiddick wasn't around. That said I've only heard it used by right-wingers looking for a cheap shot. I think for the most part it's not on the American public's radar screen anymore (although obv it would be if he ever tried to run for president again.)

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:42 (twenty years ago)

are there ideas that Kennedy owns? he's actually a very active legislator, but almost always does things in partnerships. but on the broader level, he's more of a mouthpiece than an originator. his cultural weight, such as it has ever existed (the right talks about him like 10x as much as the left these days), was as inheritor/exponent, to some extent, of the perceived moral force/personality cult of his brothers. and you know what happened to them.

― paranoianeb (gabbneb), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:47 (twenty years ago)

although obv it would be if he ever tried to run for president again

which, of course, will never happen.

are there ideas that Kennedy owns? he's actually a very active legislator, but almost always does things in partnerships

uh, isn't that how the whole process works? not sure if you're trying to be disingenuous here.

― hstencil (hstencil), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:53 (twenty years ago)

It's a way of taking a potentially interesting conversation and making it dumb and useless.

If you want to do this, by all means drag out Chappaquiddick again.

― dar1a g (daria g), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:54 (twenty years ago)

you can write a bill yourself and put it on the floor and seek co-sponsors and other support, or you can go across the aisle before putting pen to paper. teddy the k has been known to do the latter.

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:56 (twenty years ago)

and that matters how? can you cite an example of a bill that has no co-sponsorship that ever passed?

― hstencil (hstencil), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:57 (twenty years ago)

if anything, your example shows just how bankrupt the right-wing criticism of teddy is: dude is more than anything a consensus-builder, and certainly should be given more credit as such. not sure why i'm having to tell you that.

― hstencil (hstencil), Monday, 19 December 2005 18:59 (twenty years ago)

uh, what?

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Monday, 19 December 2005 19:14 (twenty years ago)

my meta-point, if i have to spell it out, is that legislation /= the kind of ideas referenced above (which i take to be sort of liberal ideals generally, which are well-known and don't live or die by one Senator without a particularly current national profile).

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Monday, 19 December 2005 19:16 (twenty years ago)

Uh, basically you two agree, I think.

― dar1a g (daria g), Monday, 19 December 2005 19:16 (twenty years ago)

i guess? but i feel like gabbneb's treating us all like don weiner, without don actually appearing on the thread yet.

― hstencil (hstencil), Monday, 19 December 2005 19:21 (twenty years ago)

old ppl who were alive in 1969, what was the coverage of the time?

It was very big coverage, enormously big. Top of the front page big. Cover of Time and Newsweek, with extensive maps, diagrams, sidebars, and speculations big. The works big.

When it happened, Ted Kennedy was absolutely presumed to be president in the very near future. The Kennedys were practically a royal family, mostly due to media fawning and the effect of the assassinations of John and Robert. Ted was a shoo-in, a prince of the blood, the next coronation (or assassination, you pick).

The tenor of the coverage was meticulously shocked, shocked that a politician would drink and play around with his secretary and then get caught in this extremely lurid manner. The media just pissed themselves with eagerness to exploit the stroy. Teddy never recovered from it and never will.

It resonates with conservatives much like their hatred of 60s hippies, beads and LSD, so much so that Ann Coulter, who is from a whole 'nother generation, can blithely toss it around as a signifier and know that she'll get the correct galvanic skin response from her audience - even the ones who are too young to remember it.

― Aimless (Aimless), Monday, 19 December 2005 19:34 (twenty years ago)

but i feel like gabbneb's treating us all like don weiner, without don actually appearing on the thread yet

You rang?

― don weiner (don weiner), Monday, 19 December 2005 21:53 (twenty years ago)

also, gabbneb treats everyone pretty much the same. It's just a lot more entertaining when I'm involved.

― don weiner (don weiner), Monday, 19 December 2005 21:55 (twenty years ago)

National Lampoon's take on it.

http://homepage.mac.com/mr_bingley/.Pictures/tedvwsmall.jpg

― nickn (nickn), Monday, 19 December 2005 23:56 (twenty years ago)

everyone being don weiner and trife

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 20 December 2005 00:10 (twenty years ago)

i blame joe pernice

― gear (gear), Tuesday, 20 December 2005 00:15 (twenty years ago)

ethan, what purpose does giving juice to all of these right-wing talking points serve? i am assuming (perhaps naively) that you are not right-wing yerself.

― Eisbär (llamasfur), Tuesday, 20 December 2005 00:36 (twenty years ago)

how is reviving Teddy's most profoundly stupid moment giving juice to anything?

― don weiner (don weiner), Tuesday, 20 December 2005 00:45 (twenty years ago)

It's not the talking points, it's the talking head. Just ignore Coulter. She only has value to the extent people pay attention to her.

― Mitya (mitya), Tuesday, 20 December 2005 01:31 (twenty years ago)

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