You know, I’m having a really hard time with this one. Senator Ted Kennedy, that “lion of the Senate”, has brain cancer. I realize that Rush Limbaugh simply meant that it could be a long time before the President gets his way with national “health care reform”, but even in jest, the idea sticks in my craw. Sad, yes. Tragic, yes. But you know, I have no more than generic sympathy for his situation because, frankly, I find it a rather fitting payback.
What? He’s done so much for the “little people”! He’s an icon, a Kennedy, for gosh’s sakes!
Well, because he’s a Kennedy, Senator Teddy quite literally got away with murder.
It’s strange how quickly we forget the real “little people”, particularly when we’re standing there with our hands out, isn’t it? I’m not so sure that the family of Mary Jo Kopechne has forgotten her needless, tragic end in the waters off Chappaquiddick Island. Nothing about that fatal night in July 1969 makes sense, even with 40 years of hindsight.
Facts: Ted Kennedy was driving, Mary Jo Kopechne was the only passenger. They left a party at Lawrence Cottage, ostensibly to get Mary Jo back to her hotel in Edgartown. He headed in the opposite direction of Edgartown and with sudden (“violent”) braking locking the wheels at approximately 34 mph and approximately 17′ from Dike Bridge, the car skidded on the uneven dirt road, bounced off Dike Bridge, and landed upside down in the water of Poucha Pond.
Ted Kennedy returned to the party. He told no one but a cousin and a friend, both lawyers, and the three of them returned to the scene of the accident. When they failed to get Mary Jo out of the car, they left. Because the ferry off the island had shut down for the night, Ted Kennedy swam back to Edgartown and his hotel (across almost 500′ of channel with currents only safely navigated by the strongest of swimmers). He did not report the accident until the next morning, after he was notified the police had already found Mary Jo’s body in his car.
Many questions surrounded the investigation, including why Kennedy was driving so fast on an uneven, unlit road. No explanation was ever given for how only Kennedy, at 6’2″, could get out through one of the open or smashed-in windows (all the car doors were locked), but little 5’2″ Mary Jo could not. Nor was it ever explained why she could not have been pulled out by the three men when they returned that same night. And last, but not least, there was no explanation for why Kennedy did not immediately seek help from any of four nearby houses, all of which were occupied the night of the accident, and at least three of which had left lights on; one plainly visible from Dike Bridge. Even the island’s fire station, only 150 yards from the cottage where Senator Kennedy was partying, could have been reached from Dike Bridge on foot in 1/2 hour.
According to John Farrer, the diver who pulled Mary Jo’s lifeless, stiff body from Ted Kennedy’s Oldsmobile the following day, “There was a great possibility that we could have saved Mary Jo’s life. There would have been an airlock in the car – there always is in such submersions – that would have kept her alive. If we had been called, I would have reached the scene in 45 minutes. I say 45 minutes because it was dark. ( The daylight recovery had taken 30 minutes ). The lack of light might have caused a delay of 15 minutes.” This is also based on the position in which she was found inside the car, “If she had been dead or unconscious, she would have been prone, sinking to the bottom or floating on top. She definitely was holding herself in a position to avail herself of the last remaining air that had to be trapped in the car.”
That is the “legacy” Senator Ted Kennedy created the night he went, driving on an expired license, to party (six married men sans wives and six single women) on Chappaquiddick Island. A murdered young woman and enough spin and “clout” to have walked away from manslaughter charges.
To name even a bridge after him would be a travesty.