I haven’t had much to say about Ted Kennedy because, honestly, everyone with anything to say has already said it and better.
Except, of course, for the fact that I’m praying for Mr. Kennedy, and hope he recovers and lives many more years. Life is much more important than politics.
First Ringer has the best compendium of Kennedy’s career I’ve yet read:
From his choices in policies to his choices in politics, Teddy has remained the well-groomed rebel, the slightly mainstreamed radical. But Kennedy’s flair for risk did not serve him as well as it did his brother. Clutching a bare 38% of the primary vote and slightly over 1,100 delegates, Kennedy carried on a quixotic floor fight culminating in his convention address that may well have signaled the beginning of the second phase of Kennedy’s political career. [He defined] himself as the champion of the “New Deal” and “Great Society” liberal Democrats…
Ted Kennedy, even when I was a kid, seemed to be the figure in which paleoliberalism showed its age – where the sixties started fraying into the seventies and spun off the rails in the eighties.
It remains more than a little tempting to ravage Kennedy, who in the preceeding 28 years after that address personified every liberal stereotype in the eyes of both conservative critics and skeptical independents. Sometimes a parody onto himself, Kennedy would bluster his way on to the national stage for every issue of note, spout the need for some massive government intervention, take a hard but blunt strike at Republican opponents of the measure and then retreat to Kennebunkport. Often lacking title in the Democratic ranks yet still given deference by pols and the media alike, Kennedy seemed more like a member of the “Patres Conscripti” of the Roman Senate – old men selected by the Roman powers that be, unencumbered by such concerns as elections. Given that Kennedy’s only received less than 60% twice in his Senate career (in 1962 and 1994), the description seems somewhat apt.
Perhaps.
I see him more like the British parliamentarians of the 1820’s; elected, but yet sitting in secure sinecures for life, loyal to factions that politically defined them.
Anyway – best wishes to Senator Kennedy.
Kennebunkport? Brilliant, First Ringer. The rest of the analysis is equally well-informed.
Enh. Anything east of the Adirondacks is pretty much interchangeable.
Yeah, cause who would know the Kennedy family has a connection to Massachusetts?
Wonder if First Ringer thinks John Kerry has a ranch in Crawford, Texas.
He did have a ranch in Crawford, but that was before he didn’t have one.
President Bush, on vacation in his dacha on the Black Sea, couldn’t be reached for comment.
The other thing Mitch, paleoliberal is about as flattering as neo-nutzie – when a man receives a pretty grim medical diagnosis, it’s not usually considered the time to take your sidelong shots.
A couple of things for you to remember when you assail the Great Society and the New Deal –
The period of growth from 1947 to 1975 was the longest sustained period of growth in our history, saw the largest growth in median income, saw the largest growth in personal free time ALL while having the highest corporate and personal income taxes on the uber rich. Part of that of course is attributable to a world where we dominated manufacturing in part due to the destruction of the manufacturing base of much of the rest of the world – but that’s not a sufficient enough explanation.
Contrastingly, in the LAST 30 years, real wages against CPI are flat – and if you include longer work hours, real hourly adjusted wages fell 12% for men between 35-45 (primary demographic). As well, energy, food, healthcare and childcare aren’t included in CPI – so it is in fact further, this despite the fact that the value of goods produced in the US has increased 50% in that period. The ONLY group doing better, you guessed it, those at the very top of the bracket. People who are in the upper 10% – they stayed a bit better than CPI, but upper 1%, four fold growth, upper .1% – oh they only saw seven fold growth in incomes. Nowhere else in the world has had that kind of disparity. The number of ‘billionaires’ – an equivilancy established as someone’s worth=20,000 laborers annual wage, jumped from 13 in 1968, to 160. Yep, your ‘ownership society’ has been a marvel – of greed whilst screwing the middle class. Bring back the Great Society and the New Deal – they were far better for the average american. The ‘rising tide’ did not, by any stretch, lift all boats – it only made those who own or lead companies, very very very very much more rich than they were, and did so by keeping a larger slice of profits for themselves.
Paleo only should apply to you – you want to reinvent the gilded age.
Peev,
paleoliberal is about as flattering as neo-nutzie
That may be the dumbest thing you’ve ever said. Perhaps even worse than your little face-plant over legal ethics the other day.
“Paleo” simply means “prehistoric”. There’s nothing derogatory about it; if you look through this blog, you seem any references not only to Paleoconservatives, but even a few paleoliberals I admire. Like my father.
On the other hand, the alliteration with “nutzie” is perfectly clear; you’re making a Nazi reference, and a particularly stupid and cowardly one (especially given that you are an anonymous commenter).
If you think there’s any comparison, then please tell me – how many suns orbit your home planet?
The rest of your comment is too risible to bother with.
Oh, what the hell; I may as well start off early:
Peev bandies about some statistics,
To hide that he sucks at linguistics
Once again, he’s off topic,
Self-indulgent; myopic.
Peev’s primary characteristics.
The period of growth from 1947 to 1975 was the longest sustained period of growth in our history, saw the largest growth in median income, saw the largest growth in personal free time ALL while having the highest corporate and personal income taxes on the uber rich.
This time period also lines up pretty well with restrictive immigration policies.
Contrastingly, in the LAST 30 years, real wages against CPI are flat
This factoid is under some dispute, but in any case it coincides with the greatest period of open immigration — and free trade — in this country’s history.
President Bush, on vacation in his dacha on the Black Sea, couldn’t be reached for comment.
Actually he’s resting at his retreat in Warm Springs, then it’s off to his Santa Barbara ranch and then a few weeks at Balmoral Castle.
“Paleo” simply means “prehistoric”.
Yay! Now I get to take Mitch to the woodshed!
“Paleo” merely means old.
“Neolithic” = “new stone (age)”
“Mezolithic” = “middle stone (age)”
“Paleolithic” = “old stone (age)”
/studied archaeology before I studied law.
Pete and Repeat said:
President Bush, on vacation in his dacha on the Black Sea, couldn’t be reached for comment…Actually he’s resting at his retreat in Warm Springs, then it’s off to his Santa Barbara ranch and then a few weeks at Balmoral Castle.
Ha ha ha!
So this affects the overall point exactly how?
(And yes, Clown, I am affecting Eastern European syntax. This bothers you why?)
Just one of many uninformed statements in First Ranger’s post. And the most easily demonstrated to the tiny brains that populate your comments section. Even the most fact-resistant wingnut will be hard-pressed to claim that Ted Kennedy lives in the Bush compound in Kennebunkport, Maine.
And like Yoda you are talking why?
this story should warm ACs tiny little heart:
http://tinyurl.com/4r3l9o
Ed Felien is a long time communist activist located in S. Mpls who will be helping to organize anarcho protests at the RNC in Sept
And exactly where Ted Kennedy lives is really, really, super important because…?
…it is the only support for angryclown’s “the rest of his post is wrong too” message? However you want to dress it up, that is simply lazy, angryclown.
You guys revel in your stupidity, Troy. It never ceases to amaze.
No, Troy’s right Clownie. All you Yankees talk funny. Maine, New Yawk, what’s the difference?
Except for Baastan. Those folks sound silly. Just ask Reverend Wright.
And “you guys” elevate an erroneous detail in an attempt to invalidate an argument?
Sorry, you might have to do a little more work than that, mister angryclown lazy-pants.
Oh, also sorry that I don’t care, and care A LOT, about exactly where Senator Kennedy lives. It’s a little trivial unless I plan on paying him a visit, and I don’t. *shrug*
No, Troy’s right Clownie. All you Yankees talk funny. Maine, New Yawk, what’s the difference?
Kermit, have you ever heard what a Minnesota accent sounds like after you’ve lived elsewhere for a few years? It’s not one of them classy or romantic accents. Unless you think Scandinavian working class people are classy or romantic.
I’ve lived in Hawaii since 1989, and my friends here (mostly folks from California or the Pacific NW) still laugh at my accent. Yet I can’t hear it in my voice, while I can tell someone is from Minnesota as soon as they open their mouth.
That means you guys must be really bad.