I could be here all day, trying to type out a suitable eulogy to America’s last liberal lion, and others have done a much better job summing up his legacy — HERE and HERE. What I will say is that Senator Edward Kennedy could very well have been the last in a long line of progressive, socially-conscious, activist legislators & politicians in the U.S. — a line stretching back to both Roosevelt presidencies, the New Deal, and the Great Society.
Watching the complete and utter lunacy that is hijacking the health care reform debates, and the consolidation of hard line partisanship, one wonders if Senator Kennedy died in despair, as he looked down upon the degeneration of compromise and co-operation in his country. It would be quite an achievement, considering the family legacy of tragedy and tears through which he had already suffered.
Many times over the last few years, I have mourned the passing of giants. Men and women who have moved mountains and demonstrated leadership above and beyond what mere mortals seem able to marshall. Men and women who have left behind a world that sorely needs their talents, their passions, and their power. In today’s Globe and Mail, John Ibbotson wisely inducts Edward Kennedy into that rarified assembly:
But, from time to time, giants of the Senate have brought healing. Henry Clay saved the union with the Missouri Compromise of 1820. Arthur Vandenberg abandoned a lifetime of isolation to support Harry Truman’s Marshall Plan. Edward Kennedy partnered with George W. Bush to pass the No Child Left Behind Act, which is already improving the nation’s public schools.
Beyond all that, he was loved…Ted Kennedy’s passing is the passing of an age.
I worry more and more, as time passes. Are we now to believe that Barack Obama will singlehandedly cure cancer, stop the seven signs of aging, transmute lead into gold, AND save his own country, let alone the rest of the world? When was the last time a Canadian political leader was as effective, as dominant, as passionate and caring, as dynamic, as Edward Kennedy? Where is the legacy?
Right now, there is no one — anywhere, in any democratic nation — to fill Senator Kennedy’s shoes…and we are all the worse for this terrible fact.
