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I feel so much that it is difficult to know what to say, yet just feeling, without attempting to give voice to the emotions released by the passing of Edward M. "Teddy" Kennedy seems inadequate.
I feel a vague sense of dread or fear: we have lost a champion who time and time again rushed into the fray to protect those of us unable to stand alone against ignorance, injustice and intolerance. No successor is yet apparent and those he held at bay still circle, waiting for an opening; desperate for an opportunity to reverse the progress Ted had managed against often overwhelming odds.
I was in junior high school when Ted was first elected to the Senate. Though I've spent my life in Illinois, he was "one of my Senators" throughout my adult life. If you were a liberal, Ted was your senator, no matter where you cast your vote.
And, that's another reason I respected Ted Kennedy: he wasn't only a liberal, he called himself a liberal and said he was proud to be a liberal even after a couple of decades of right wing slander had made the term an epithet in much of America. Ted never "rounded off the corners" and claimed to be a "progressive".
Ted Kennedy was born into a privileged lifestyle, a member of an elite and wealthy family known and respected around the world. His tireless efforts on behalf of the poor, the disadvantaged, the disfavored were certainly not motivated by self interest. He didn't NEED anything. Yet, he gave so much to so many.
INTEGRITY---was a "given" with Ted. He would have been quick to concede that he was as flawed as any mortal, yet the negatives that are even now being revisited by some small and bitter partisans in an effort to diminish him, never really concealed his genuine and passionate concern for the entire human family. It has been said that people don't care what you know until they know how much you care. We KNEW Ted cared. And, he certainly knew quite a bit, too.
Of course, I will end this with the quote you'll doubtless hear or read several times in the next few days. But, don't just read it: FEEL it! Let it stir your heart, moisten your eye and steel your resolve to DO what we must this fall.
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."
---Edward M. "Teddy" Kennedy, 1980
amen.
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