Senator Edward Moore Kennedy has been diagnosed with a malignant glioma, one of the most lethal forms of brain cancer.  He and his family will go through hell in the next year or so.  Death from brain cancer is no walk in the park by any means.

Some people admire Senator Kennedy.  Some people despise him.  Some people have supported the policies he has championed and some have opposed those policies.  Some people who know Senator Kennedy speak of him as a despicable human being and some who know him equally as well speak of him as a demi-god.

What I don't understand is this:  Senator Kennedy did not contract a fatal brain disease because he may be a despicable human being.  It is not God's punishment for the way he has lived his life.  Why, then, is there such venom being spewed out in reaction to his disease?

how you define punishment.

Why the venom?  Because it's what they do.  None of them are gonna die.  And especially none of them are gonna need their diapers changed while they die.  They don't change their diapers even now.

forgiven for, and IMHO, cheating on tests and leaving women to die in wrecks are pretty clear issues, not something any man should have to think about.

But we'll all get around to dying, and gloating over anybody's death is pretty lame.  

Willie: You are already brain dead and lame to boot. Keep drinking your swill.

Well this may be callous, but I just don't feel much sympathy for Ted himself. I empathize with his family for the very difficult time they are to face, and I don't wish their experience on anyone.

As for Ted himself though, no, I am sorry, I just can't muster up the ability to feel bad for his lot in life. I feel tremendous pity for Mary Jo who ripped off every fingernail on her hands in her frantic attempts to claw her way out of the car before she died. But for the man who left her there to die and hid himself in a hotel overnight while trying to figure out how to cover his ass - no, I don't feel any worse for him than I would feel for any convicted murderer on death row.

Perhaps that makes me a bad person, but at least I am an honest one.

he would have perhaps left public life, and dedicated himself to actually being the Patriarch of the clan.  Instead he seemed to relish the role of drunken Irishman

expressed remorse for the events of that night.  I have personally been on the bridge at Chappaquiddick and can honestly say that for a man from a family with a tradition in sailing and life around water and the ocean, for him to have done nothing says a lot about him.  The stream is not that deep, the bridge is not that high... and the banks are not that steep... I was shocked when I saw first hand what had been presented as a torrential flood, most like the raging Colorado as it twists and winds down into the Grand Canyon.  Instead I was met with a slow moving, shallow, sand bottomed stream about 5-8 feet deep.

The really sad part of all of this is that because of the power of his family, and their influence on all things politic in that state, we will probably never know the truth of what actually happened - but as you point out what we do know is pretty damning.

Tragically, most of the legislation he has crafted is designed to create a 2-tier citizenry in this country, with his family well in the "more equal" category.

Years ago, I lived in the east end of Long Island....  what was tragic to see there - was how the old-monied elite gay men would obtain young poor "Studs" to be their playthings.  To take to Fire Island and parade around... when these "toys" would contract the HIV virus... well, they would be discarded - like old socks that had too many holes in them....   When I look at the incident on Martha's Vineyard, and Kennedy - I think, he needed to discard an inconvenient person....   but we will never really know.

Sins.... I for one - do feel the same.

I wonder if he is going to do some reflection and make any public statements about things in his past.

Up till now, he sure didn't seem to be bothered by a guilty conscience.  Maybe people with no character and no integrity have no conscience-----or no soul!!!!

"technical term" only as far as it's meant to sound important and scientific.   It's your judgment that the behavior of a person you have never met follows the DSM patterns, more than most people, and to the degree that you regard it as a problem.

Yes, I will grant that your WEG is probably as good as most shrinks, but no better than mine or most historians.

MANY politicians and leaders are ruthless, egotistical and wildly irresponsible.  You don't find many Albert Schweitzers running countries, do you?   More to the point, GW Bush probably fits the 'sociopath' pattern as closely as Fat Ted - and mind you, I'm not contesting the judgment, though I'm sure many shrinks & MA voters would.

What president can you think of that was a polar opposite of these assholes?  Ike?  

But the "technical term" is bullshit.  There's nothing scientific about it - it's not reproducible, nor falsifiable in any way, is it?    So it's not quite as scientific as say cold fusion.

I'm going to tell you, the validity of a judgment correlates directly to knowledge of relevant facts.   The only time a shrink can beat a cop is when the shrink is through and the cop is lazy, and you know how often that happens.    

This is the term used in the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV). According to DSM-IV, a person can be diagnosed as antisocial if since age 15 he or she has shown a pervasive pattern of disregard for, and violation of, the rights of others. The person must have indicated at least three of the following:

Failure to conform to lawful social norms  (ted done that)
Deceitfulness (Ted done that)
Impulsivity or failure to plan ahead (ted done that)
Irritability and aggressiveness, as indicted by repeated physical fights or assaults (Ted done that)
Reckless disregard for safety of self or others (ted done that)
Consistent irresponsibility, as indicated by repeated failure to sustain consistent work behavior (TED done that) or honor financial obligations (National debt - ted done that)
Lack of remorse, as indicated by being indifferent about having hurt, mistreated or stolen from another  AND HERE TED DONE THAT IN SPADES

spending all of your monthly Socialistic Insecurity checks at his bar. Sober up, harry.  Your shouldn't be drinking away your stipend.

disagree with your dx of Teddy as a sociopath, only pointed out that (a) many politicians are clearly worse - being half a shithead seems to be what it takes to get ahead there; and (d) the limitations of the description itself.  

It's not real technical when an in absentia dx can be made, now is it?  IOW, 'sociopath' is the name a pseudo-scientist calls an asshole.   Asshole is the name most people use use for an asshole.

was the Irishman.

But you don't understand English, so what the hell.  I could drink Harry under the table, and still run circles around both of you.

anybody with a copy of the DSM wants to stick on you & you & all the rest.

The trick is, to be the 1st out of the box with any half-assed credible shrink dx.  IOW, don't pick Tom Cruise.  Pick some idiot off a university staff, to dx the most visible behavior pattern of the target person involved. OF COURSE we know he's FUCKN MORON spewing TOTAL BULLSHIT, but who worries about it?

Then you pay him to write some trash that somebody might believe, and whenever somebody points out that it's TOTAL BULLSHIT, you just repeat it.  When you are using a psych dx, you NEVER EVER ADDRESS THE FACTS.  You just repeat the conclusory dx, as if you were talking to an inmate.  That of course makes a normal person crazy.

drummed you out of the race long ago, because you are far too stupid to figure out nobody ever complimented you in such a way.

I thought it was the party of greed, gluttony & stupidity!

My personal opinion, which I tried to keep out of the original message, is that Senator Kennedy is and always has been a thoroughly despicable human being, but even despicable human beings can have some good qualities.

I guess what I really was nonplussed about was why we feel such glee when the mighty fall--the classic schadenfreude.  I just don't understand that feeling and I think that feeling diminishes us as human beings.

JMHO, of course.

feel elated when others falter.  My reason for charting Kennedy's fall is to try to understand was there something I could have done to prevent such a miserable human being from gaining a position of power.  sadly, there was nothing.

I do suspect that kennedy was shaped by his environment - and one wonders what parenting was let loose in the kennedy "Compound."  Just the fact that they would call their home a "compound" says volumes.

No, there is no glee...  only the comentary on a man who should never have held office - and that he has held a position of power for so long sadly comments on us all....  so I do not know what there would be to be gleeful of.

I take a backseat to no one in my disgust with Kennedy's politics and personal behavior. I was on a commercial flight to PVD with him once and he was pleasant to anyone who spoke to him. But I also saw him treat the driver of the car service like a dog. There was one face when there were wits and one when he thought no one was looking. The Mary Jo story revealed the real Ted, who was corrupt to boot. I personally know a guy who got very rich as a result of a heads up from Kennedy with the understanding he would let Kennedy kids invest in the start up business. He did and they all made a pile.

All that said, I wish he was healthy so I could campaign for whoever runs against him.

Old Joe was off making money, bootlegging, manipulating the stock market and fucking Gloria Swanson while Rose was sitting in oblivious religious rapture all the time, trying to ignore the fact that Old Joe was never home and was off fucking Gloria Swanson and others.  The children were raised by nannies.

-- Modified on 5/25/2008 12:36:32 PM