Another MIA post. Thanks Cathy.
August 28, 2009
Sen Kennedy eulogies/funeral music/speeches/videos
The now senior senator from Massachusetts, John Kerry speaks about his good friend and colleague, Ted Kennedy.
http://www.lightupthedarkness.org/blog/?p=172
PoliticsNewsPolitcs
[hand transcribed]
Greets family.
Thank you for the privilege of sharing some words here today about my friend and my colleague of a quarter of a century.
From the moment of fateful diagnosis fourteen months ago until he left us, we saw grace and courage, dignity and humility, joy and laughter, and so much love and gratitude lived out on a daily basis that our cup does run over.
How devastating the prognosis was as Ted left MGH with his family, waving to all, June, a year ago. And that he lived the next fourteen months in the way that he did: optimistic, full of hope, striving, and accomplishing still, that he did that is in part a miracle, yes, but it’s equally a triumph of the love and the care that Vicki, their children, and all who cherished him gave in such abundance.
In many ways, I think it’s fair to say, that this time – these last months – were a gift to all of us. The last months of his life, were in many ways, the sweetest of seasons because he saw how much we love him, how much we respect him, and how unbelievably grateful we are for his stunning years of service and friendship.
And what a year he had, my friends.
He accomplished more in that span of time than many senators do in a lifetime: Mental Health Parity, the Tobacco Act, a healthcare bill out of his committee, he spoke at the Democratic Convention, he wrote his memoirs, and he was there for the signing of the Edward M Kennedy Service America Act and received the Medal of Freedom from the president and a knighthood from the Queen of England.
I think many of you who were there would agree with me that perhaps one of the most poignant moments of all was when he was awarded an honorary degree from Harvard. His staff through the years was gathered in the front, and friends and family and admirers were scattered throughout the audience and filled the room and Vice President-Elect Biden was there, and you had no idea how hard Ted practiced and worked to be able to do that and the convention and his appearance at the White House to make a speech that lived up to his high standards.
He took the stage at Harvard, and for a few moments we all worried that it would be difficult to pull off, and then before you know it, his voice began to soar and the pace picked up and he inspired again with a stunning re-statement of his purpose in public life.
When it was over, the applause never wanted to end. He stayed on the stage, reaching out to us, and we to him, and we wanted him to stay there forever.
PART 2
PoliticsNewsPolitcs
I first met Ted Kennedy when I was 18 years old, as a volunteer for his first Senate campaign in the summer before I went to college. Then I met him again when I returned from Vietnam and we veterans encamped on the mall in Washington. It was Ted Kennedy who had the courage to come down to the mall one night and in a tent, listen to us talk about Vietnam. We were controversial, but Ted broke the barriers, and other senators followed.
He worked his heart out for me in the presidential raec of 2004, and he made the difference in Iowa. When we were down in the polls and I was slugging it out there, Ted brought his humor, his energy and his eloquence to Davenport to help melt the snows of that state.
There we were just two weeks before the caucuses and his voice boomed out in this room: ‘You voted for my brother. You voted for my other brother. You didn’t vote for me!’
And as the crowd roared with laughter, Ted bellowed: ‘But we’re back here for John Kerry. And if you vote for John Kerry, I’ll forgive you! You can have three out of four’, he said, ‘and I’ll love you, and I’ll love Iowa’.
And let me tell you, Iowa loved him.
We had a lot of fun there. He would open an event and he’d come out and he’d say: ‘I want to talk to you about a bold, handsome, intelligent leader, a man who should not only be president, but who should end up on Mount Rushmore – but enough about me. Now I’ll talk about John Kerry.’
After that agonizing Tuesday night in November when we fell so short in one state, there were Ted and Vicki, on Wednesday morning, sitting with Teresa and me in the kitchen in Boston, as we prepared to concede.
He was always there when you needed him.
And so were Sunny and Splash, incidentally, when you didn’t.
Once when we were at a Senate retreat, Ted had just spoken and then Joe Biden got up to make a point and rejoinder. And as Joe got more forceful in his argument, he started to gesture, and he took a step towards Ted. Boom! Sunny and Splash were up on their feet, barking wildly, defending Kennedy territory with a vengeance, and Ladies and Gentlemen, for the first time in history, we witnessed a Biden rhetorical retreat.
One of my really favorite moments was Ted campaigning with my daughter Vanessa, who is here, campaigning in New Mexico. They were visiting an Indian Reservation and the Tribal Medicine Man wanted to bestow a blessing. He took a feather and chanted as he asked Vanessa and Ted to stand side by side and extend their hands and bow their heads. With a sacred feather he touched their feet and their foreheads, touched their hands and their feet all the while chanting away. And when he finished, Ted leaned over to Vanessa and whispered: ‘I think we just got married.’
Well, you can imagine!
A couple of months later, she got a note from Teddy which said: ‘No matter what happens, we will always have New Mexico.’
One of the framed notes in Ted’s senate office was a thank you from a colleague for a gift – a special edition of “Profiles in Courage.” This is what it said: ‘I brought it home and re-read it. What an inspiration! Thank you, my friend, for your many courtesies. If the world only knew.’ It was signed by Trent Lott, the Republican leader of the Senate.
Indeed, if everyone only knew…
When George Wallace was wounded in an assassination attempt, the first to visit him was Ted Kennedy.
When Joe Biden underwent brain surgery for an aneurysm, the first to board the train to Wilmington was Ted Kennedy.
When Jesse Helms announced he had to undergo heart valve surgery, Helms told his constituents back in North Carolina: ‘It’s no piece of cake, but it sure beats listening to Ted Kennedy on the Senate floor.’
So Ted wrote a note to Jesse, saying: ‘I’d be happy to send you tapes of my recent Senate speeches, if that will help you to a speedy recovery!’
And just two weeks ago, when I was in the hospital after hip surgery, just like Chris Dodd, there was Ted Kennedy on the phone asking how I was doing with all that he was dealing with.
In his life, as we all knew, Ted knew the dark night of loss, and I think that’s why his empathy was global and deeply personal. After my father died of cancer just days before the convention in 2000, there was a knock at the door, completely unexpected, and standing there on the front porch was Ted Kennedy, dropping by to hug and talk and just pass time with us.
For 25 years, I was privileged to work by his side, learning from the master. And over the years, I have received hundreds of handwritten notes from Ted – some funny, some touching, a few correcting me, all of them special treasures now.
He thanked me for my gift of a Catholic study Bible, commenting: ‘My mother would be very grateful to you for keeping me in line.’
He thanked me for a particularly challenging charter lift home after 9/11 when it was hard to get anything in the air. And he wrote: ‘Here’s a riddle for you: What do you get when you make 3 calls to the FAA, 2 calls to the Secretary of Transportation and 3 calls to Signature Flight support? You get a great trip to Boston!’ His way of saying thank you.
And he thanked Teresa and me for the gift of a vintage bottle, concluding: “I just hope that I’ve aged as well as this wine!’
PART 3
The personal touch Ted brought to life extended well beyond his senate colleagues. It reflected the kind of man he was and the kind of laws he wrote.
For 1,000 days in the White House, as Chris Dodd mentioned, John Kennedy inspired us. For 80 days on the presidential campaign trail, Robert Kennedy gave us reason to believe and hope again. And for more than 17,000 days as a United States senator, Ted Kennedy changed the course of history as few others have.
Without him, there might still be a military draft….the war in Vietnam might have lasted longer….there might have been delays in granting the Voting Rights Act or in passing Medicare or Medicaid….Soviet Jewish refuseniks might have been ignored…and who would have been there to help them as Ted did?
Without him we might not have stood up against the apartheid as forcefully as we did and the barriers to fair immigration might still be higher today.
If everyone only knew…
Without Ted, 18-year-olds might not be able to vote, there might not be a Martin Luther King day, Meals on Wheels, student loans, increases in the minimum wage, equal funding for women’s college sports, health insurance, the Family Medical Leave Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, workplace safety, Americorps, Children’s health insurance.
If everyone only knew…
He stood against judges who would turn back the clock on Constitutional rights. He stood against the war in Iraq – his proudest vote. And for nearly four decades, and all through his final days, he labored with all his might to make health care a right for all Americans – and we will do that in his honor!
In these last months, every visit Ted made to the Senate elicited an unstoppable outpouring of affection. Tears welled up in the eyes of Republican and Democrat. Everyone missed his skills, his booming call to arms, and conscience. On his last visit, Chris Dodd and I sat in the back row beside his desk and listened to Teddy regale us with an imitation of his efforts to practice throwing out a ball for the Red Sox opening game. (video) He laughed and poked fun at how reluctant his hand and muscles were to obey his commands.
I was in awe of this moment of humility and self-deprecating humor in the face of genuine frustration. As he so often said over the years, we have to take issues seriously, but never take ourselves too seriously.
He was a master of that, too, and one of the great lessons he taught me.
In the end, his abiding gift was his incomparable love of life, and his commitment to make better the life of the world. In between his time changing the world, he found time to capture it in marvelous paintings. He was a talented, gifted artist and, as we know, an incurable romantic.
Who else would have thought to hide their engagement ring on a coral reef in Saint Croix so as they were swimming and diving, so Vicki could find it?
It never occurred to him that the waters might have swept the ring away.
But one thing is certain: their love endured from then until now, and it will endure forever.
Massachusetts has always had its own glorious love affair with the sea. Like his brothers before him, salt water was in his veins. Teddy lived by the sea, and he lived joyously on it. The evening he passed away, I looked out at the ocean, where gray sky met gray water, no horizon, the sky almost seemed to be in mourning. It was not a time for sailing.
But the next afternoon as I sat at his home, I looked out at a perfect Nantucket Sound and thought to myself with certainty: He’s on a schooner now. He’s sailing — Jack, Joe, Bobby on the foredeck, Rosemary, Eunice, Kathleen, Pat – trading stories with their parents and Teddy at the helm, steering his steady course. Sail on my friend. Sail on.
