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From CNN:

(CNN) -- Massachusetts Sen. Edward Kennedy, the patriarch of the first family of Democratic politics, died Wednesday at his home in Hyannisport, Massachusetts, after a lengthy battle with brain cancer. He was 77.

I forsee dancing and rejoicing in many camps tonight.

He was perhaps the most beloved and the most hated man in the Senate, I'll give you that.

Waiting for the right wing to start the party........

Not only the right wing, a lot of people hate him for events in his past.

Being defeated in an election, resigning in disgrace, those are things I might have smiled about, not the man dying.

I agree. Its never a party when someone dies (ok except skum).

I'm feeling nothing but large quantaties of apathy, personaly. I can't bring myself to particularly care either way.

Really? Obviously the man had big no-no's in his personal life; but professionally, his career was marked (even more than his brothers, IMHO) by a regard and willingness to fight for the common man quite beyond what one would expect from his blue blood.

Mikey wrote:...Obviously the man had big no-no's in his personal life...

Oh boy... I really didn't want to get into this.

A court just recently ruled on a DWI fatality case, and overruled this man's appeals. If killing someone while driving drunk is murder, then Ted Kennedy was a murderer. Simple as that.

The fact that his heritage and expensive lawyers prevented him from spending a day in prison doesn't change that; it only implies a double standard.

None of which do I disagree with. None of which changes the fact of his work, either.

Mikey wrote:...None of which changes the fact of his work, either.

Conceded. He has done good. None of which makes up for what he did.

How do we know the fellow in the article I listed won't "turn his life around" and go on to be a Nobel prize winning scientist?

Unlikely? Yes. But he'll never have the chance. I dislike double standards very much. Rich people should receive the same treatment as the rest of us, but they don't, and Teddy's case is a prime example of that.

It's larger than that - it started with papa Joe making his money on breaking Prohibition and running rum. If the guy in the article you cite had committed his crime at the same time as the Chappaquiddick (sp?) incident, however, he very likely wouldn't have received a double-standard sentence.

Be that as it may, I'm not defending Ted Kennedy's personal life. I'm just saying that it has nothing to do with the positives of his professional life that I mentioned.

Mikey wrote:...I'm not defending Ted Kennedy's personal life. I'm just saying that it has nothing to do with the positives of his professional life that I mentioned.

There are times when I can separate a person's professional life from their personal, but again: how many people who could've turned their life around and done good for society were denied the chance? The only reason he was let loose was because his family had connections. As a reversal of your argument, if Ted Kennedy had done what he did today, would he be charged and convicted and treated the same as the fellow in that article? Maybe. I doubt it, though that might just be my cynicism kicking in.

Mikey wrote:Really? Obviously the man had big no-no's in his personal life; but professionally, his career was marked (even more than his brothers, IMHO) by a regard and willingness to fight for the common man quite beyond what one would expect from his blue blood.

My apathy's mostly motivated by lack of anything other than general knowledge about what he's done. I'm sure if I knew more about him I'd feel something, but as it stands I don't.