Ted Kennedy may have had a stroke

Hopefully the ambulance avoided any bridges on the way to the hospital.

Well played, sir.

"Mary Jo Kopechne reached for me with her cold, dead hands, but I was able to escape her deadly grasp and live another day."

(Insert old joke about his Dewars levels being a quart low here)

Just curious, I'd like to know the CHUD Politics group's thoughts on Chappaquidick (sp?).

You don't runaway from the scene of an accident no matter who you are or how fucked up it was.

Also, Irish or no, you gotta wonder if the guy developed a drinking problem as a result.

But yeah, I'm with JVC. The guy seems to have exhibited pretty vile behaviour in the incident, and maybe, just maybe, it shook him up and nudged him towards attempting to atone in his political life. Or maybe not, who knows. He acted pretty spoiled when they made that attempt to place a wind farm near his summer home or whatever, as reported on The Daily Show.

I have to admit, I often wish this guy wasn't such a big part of the Democratic party.

The guy is responsible for raising higher wages, national medical care for children, and a million other progressive stances. You might want to reconsider your opinion.

He's called for a national health care system, too (Medicare for all, I think he called it.) He may have accidentally killed someone, and he's no RFK, but he's not someone you want to throw under the bus in the Democratic Party (unlike, say, that traitorous, moronic lapdog Joe Lieberman.) Also, the public service thing? That's something he more or less seems to have adopted from Robert. Not sure if that has anything to do with anything, though.

However, throwing the phrase "throwing [someone or something] under the bus" under the bus is still under consideration.

It's a brain tumor
Damn.

A Malignant one at that. Christ.

Fucking God couldn't find anyone else in Washington to offload that one on, eh?

I'd blame the Clinton's.

Seriously? The man who left a woman to die (seriously, he didn't call rescuers to the scene so she died) and you think God is maliciously picking on him?

Sen. Edward Kennedy has malignant brain tumor.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080520/ap_on_go_co/kennedy

(Shakes head)

Anyone hear the Kennedy dude has a malignant brain tumor? It's like all over the news. *looks up* Whuuuuu???

Now more people post links.

Oh, and I'm really glad to I'm not a Kennedy.

More like DEAD Kennedy, heh heh.

That's been my take on it, too. I'll admit to always being fascinated with the Kennedys, but I've never been an apologist about the trouble they've caused themselves and other people. And while he did something unforgivable, it does seem that he's spent the better part of his life trying to atone for what he did. It won't bring back the girl who died, and it won't erase what he did, but I also don't think he's a monster. True, he caused that tragedy, but it's probably been on his conscience for 40 years.

That much being said, he sure doesn't deserve this.

How many people really deserve the deadly ailments they get?

Deservin' ain't got nothin' to do with it. We've all got it coming.

Unless you have a potrait of yourself tucked away in a basement somewhere.

Yeah you're right, fuck him!

Unpleasant ways to die are never good, but most brain tumors aren't actually terribly painful or bad for their victims. Most go a little senile then die pretty quickly. On the other hand, a slow tumor may mean he has a long road of chemo and radiation ahead, which may or may not cause a significant amount of suffering.

I don't choose to think he's been "atoning for his past," though. Much as I'd like to think positively of people, even if you panic and think someone has died in a car accident with you, the solution is to *call the cops* not abandon the car, the scene, and not call the cops. Freak out at the scene for a while? Sure. In that location and historical time, taking a while to find a place with a phone? Sure. But going to a place with a working phone and then not using it for ten hours? Nope. Then making up a story about trying to rescue the girl which is full of lies? Bad idea.

"Id facere laus est quod decet, non quod licet" - Seneca
(He deserves praise who does what he ought, not what he may.)

"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character." - MLK, Jr.

Okay, I stand corrected. You're right, he deserves to die a horrible death for a stupid, fucked up accident forty years ago. Why assume that maybe he changed for the better over the course of the years? Nope, no second chances to make up for past screw ups here.
Obviously. How's a brain tumor? Atonement enough?

Kennedy had lost two older brothers to assassins and another in a war, and his sister was lobotomized by the time Chappaquidick happened. I'm no shrink, but I have to imagine that fucks a guy up just a little*. I'm a Kennedy fan** from way back and a blue-bleeding Democrat and I agree with Lisa and Joe: Life is shades of grey, and what he did was amazingly wrong, but I think his record since then more than demonstrates the content of his character. And nobody deserves a brain tumor which is almost certainly going to be fatal.

But please, feel more than free to continue standing on your soapbox. We should expect it by now. It is, after all, your way.

*Also guaranteed to give a guy many issues: Your dad is Joe Kennedy.

**But that doesn't mean I can't say Michael Skakel should have gotten what he deserved a lot, lot sooner.

You know, I've had a malignant brain tumor and have had to spend a lot of time in wards with people with other, varied types of malignant brain tumors and I've got to tell you, you have no fucking idea what you're talking about.

Also, after all the crap you've given me about my religious affiliation and lifestyle in other threads, you eagerness to equate retribution and justice and painful, terminal diseases with divine retribution strikes me as horribly disturbing. You like to quote Gandhi... he wouldn't pin a brain tumor as a means of justice on anyone. Neither would Christ... or any sane, compassionate individual.

I never said he deserved to die a horrible death, and I don't think that cancer is in any way an "atonement" (WTF?) for anyone. Perhaps I should have been more clear but I don't wish him ill at all.

I just don't think the remark that implied God was picking on Ted Kennedy was appropriate. He's not Mother Theresa, he's not the Dalai Lama, he's not some paragon of virtue. I didn't say he hasn't done good works . I just think that someone slowly drowning as the tide comes in is an unimaginably horrible thing. Failing to prevent that personally and with several other associates supposedly informed of the wreck but also not intervening makes Kennedy and his colleagues in this crime quite unpleasant to me.

Also, by the way, he was already a senator when the incident occurred, so it wasn't like he changed from some other life to a life of public service. Although it did remove the focus from him as the next candidate for president.

If you are able to get over your distaste of his inaction at the drowning of that young woman, that's fine. I simply cannot. I must just not be as forgiving as you are.

You're an idiot who isn't nearly as smart as she thinks she is.

I have in no way "equate[d] retribution and justice and painful terminal diseases with divine retribution." Some one else did, and I thought it inappropriate. I don't believe that there is a god interacting with people, so there is no way I could think that any god was acting on Sen. Kennedy. I just think it absurd that if someone thought that a god was interacting with people and giving Kennedy a tumor, that he's the worst politician to pick.

I love you too.

No, seriously, I'd post a picture of that self-clowning oven after Cuchalain's post if that shit weren't cliche.

What makes me stupid? That I am disgusted by manslaughter/negligent homicide/whatever the term is for it? Or that I think it absurd when someone says Or just that you disagree with my distaste for Sen. Kennedy and therefore, since you have no rational argument, you're resorting to an ad hominem attack?

ETA: as for my knowledge of brain tumors, I am not a physician, and certainly not a neurosurgeon nor an oncologist. However, when reading things about brain tumors in humans, aside from headaches (which can certainly be debilitating), brain tumors in general do not have pain as the primary symptom, it appears. Most have neurologic signs, such as lethargy, ataxia, defects of proprioception, numbness, tingling, etc. In no way do I mean to suggest that people suffering from brain tumors do not have valid pain, suffering, etc. Just that on the grand scale of poor prognosis malignancies, some are worse (much more severe unrelenting pain until death) and some are more comfortable for the patient (weight loss, fatigue, weakness, etc - but not agonizing pain). Many forms of brain cancer (perhaps not Senator Kennedy's, I don't know) are relatively kind to the patient in the grand scheme of terminal malignancies.

I don't know, I think you've pretty much been shown your own rational argument is bullshit by people other than myself in this thread. Ad hominem attacks are way more fun at this point.

You see, you'd have the moral high ground here if you expressed your belief that there isn't a God interacting with people by taking issue with the concept of God doling out brain tumors as a means of retribution. Alas, you DID NOT do that. You took issue with the assertion that Edward Kennedy is not them ost deserving person in Washington for that particular type of retribution, which makes you look like a cruel and vindictive person.

Yes.

Why don't you go play with Devin, then, since that's his game, not mine?

Okay, then, again, for the cheap seats:

I'm not Ted Kennedy, and neither are you. We don't have his experiences, so neither you nor I can say what was in his head during the whole unfortunate Chappquidick incident, which was before my time. I believe that there's a right thing to do and a wrong thing to do, and in this situation, he absolutely, 110 percent, without a doubt, did the wrong thing. It was disgraceful, shameful, and not at all behavior worthy of a representative of the U.S. government. But he would not be the first.

There are moral absolutes, but to quote Jed Bartlet, more often than not, those days involve a body count. A young woman lost her life, and I'm not defending that. What I am defending is the context, the shades of grey, which is what this is.

Do I think he regrets it? Yes. Does what happened make him evil and worthy of a brain tumor? No. Does that discount his almost 40 years of service to try and make people's lives a little better? Certainly not at all. And c'mon. These are the fucking Kennedys we're talking about -- if Ted had really wanted to run for President after that, he would have run for President.

Nearly 40 years in the senate is almost a lifetime. He could have peaced out and chilled in Chappaquidick a long, long time ago. But he didn't, and he worked to make people's lives better instead. And that, to me, is honorable. It doesn't excuse what happened, but it certainly deserves consideration.

Which seems like more than what you're willing to give him.

Plus, you're stupid.

Honestly, the backpeddaling is almost as bad as what you've already said. As Rath pointed out, there are shades of gray, which you're clearly not willing to look at. No one here is defending him for Chappaquiddick. But it's also not the whole entire picture of the man's life. Not that you care to listen, obviously - you're clearly content to paint him with as big of a brush as you can find and call it done. And the part about brain tumors being no big deal was priceless - no, really, please re-read what you said:
Nope, I'm sure a brain tumor is just a day of sunshine and roses. Which, not only are you wrong, but the fact that you're wrong was nicely pointed out by the guy who had a brain tumor.
Come on. That just came across as an attempt to deflect attention away from yourself. To turn it around on Devin, who hasn't even posted a word in this thread? Nope, not buying it.

Back in my early twenties I worked in a nursing home for six months.
Most of the patients suffered from senile dementia, which can be pretty bad, but the saddest thing I saw in my short stint there was a woman in her late fifties being recently diagnosed with a insanely aggressive brain tumor.

You almost got the feeling that her head was about to burst, she had periods of intense headaches, and just sat in a chair all day just staring at nothing.
She had been completely normal just a month or so before, but died shorty after she was admitted to the nursing home.
It can be a bad fucking way to go.