Trump Jr. is a flawed copy of Trump. Bobby Kennedy and RFK Jr. are not in the same universe.
The post below was published on June 6, 2018, the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Bobby Kennedy. I’ve published six posts about Bobby Kennedy over the years.
The feeling many of us had toward Bobby Kennedy is based on a complicated and tragic part of our history. His brother, the President, had been assassinated five years earlier. Martin Luther King Jr. had been assassinated months before. Just as importantly, it increasingly looked like Bobby Kennedy would be the next Democratic candidate for president, and would win, starting the process of getting out of Vietnam. Above all that, separate from the Kennedy legacy and from the politics, he was beloved.
Then he was gone. The Democratic Convention was a disaster. Hubert Humphrey was the candidate, who lost and gave us Richard Nixon. So it goes.
The feeling many of us–most Americans–have toward RFK Jr., our health czar, is indescribably negative and scared. He has Bobby Kennedy’s name and DNA, and nothing else.
My advice: Every time you see RFK Jr. or hear about another of his outrages, take a moment to learn a little more about Bobby Kennedy. The post below can be a start.
Come, my friends,
‘T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Ulysses by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
Bobby Kennedy was killed 50 years ago today, in the midst of what might have been a successful campaign for the Democratic nomination and for the presidency in 1968. We don’t know unwritten stories. He was 42 years old.
You will find plenty of perspectives on Bobby Kennedy published today, and in the dozens of books and hundreds of essays written about him and his place in history. I’ve written about him too, but today I find myself with little new to say.
Instead, I’ll quote, as I have before, from a poem he recited on the campaign trail.
The poem is Ulysses (1842), written by Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
Imagine that. A 20th century politician reciting a 19th century poem about a hero who first appeared more than two thousand years earlier. Not just any poem and hero, but an idealistic poem about a hero who reluctantly takes on a mission. Having already sacrificed family life for duty, he can’t help but set out one more time. Leaving the life of ease behind, he fiercely pursues a dream until the end of days.
The language of the poetry may be old-fashioned to the modern ear, but please read it carefully. It remains a timeless description of what drives people to mission and sacrifice, in spite of the lure of comfort and the toll of years. If America needed that—and almost got it—in 1968, we need it now.
…Come, my friends,
‘T is not too late to seek a newer world.
Push off, and sitting well in order smite
The sounding furrows; for my purpose holds
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths
Of all the western stars, until I die.
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down:
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles,
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew.
Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Bob Schwartz 