Edward Moore Kennedy
Edward Moore Kennedy, Sr., born February 22, 1932 in Boston and died August 25, 2009 in Hyannis Port, is an American politician.
Member of the Democratic Party, he is a senator from Massachusetts in Congress of the United States from 1962 until his death. Known as Ted, he was a figurehead of the Democratic Party, one of the most liberal politicians in the country (left wing of the Democratic Party) and the brother of former President John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
Youth, education and family life
Edward Moore Kennedy is the youngest of nine children of Joseph Patrick Kennedy and Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy. He is the younger brother of John and Robert Kennedy.
Student at Milton Academy, he entered Harvard College in 1950, which it suspended in 1951 for passing an examination in Spanish on his behalf by another student.
After two years in the U.S. Army, he spent stationed in Paris, he returned to Harvard, where he graduated in 1956.
In 1958, he attended summer courses at the Academy of International Law, The Hague and participated in the campaign for reelection to the Senate of his brother John.
After earning his law degree from the University of Virginia, Ted Kennedy was admitted to the Massachusetts Bar in 1959.
He married Joan Bennett (born September 9, 1936) November 29, 1958, he has three children: Kara (born 1960), Edward Jr. (born 1961) and Patrick (born 1967). The couple divorced in 1982.
He married Victoria Reggie, divorced with two children, Curran and Caroline.
Ted Kennedy is also the grandfather of four grandchildren and thirteen tutor other children of his brothers John and Robert after their murders in 1963 and 1968.
Political Career
Ted Kennedy is elected to the Senate of the United States in 1962 to the seat left vacant by his brother John was elected President of the United States in November 1960. Ted has been consistently re-elected senator from Massachusetts in Congress in the elections of 1964, 1970, 1976, 1982, 1988, 1994, 2000 and 2006 (69% of the vote against 31% Kenneth Chase).
In 2005 he became the oldest senator in office after Robert Byrd.
Ted Kennedy is or was a member of several committees including those Democrats on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, Judiciary Committee, the Armed Services Committee ...
He is the founder of the Friendship Group of delegates with Ireland.
An early political career Eventful
Since the 1962 elections, the name of Ted Kennedy was contiguous to tales of sex, corruption or accidental deaths. In 1962, he was accused of being a novice using his name and his fortune to be elected.
In 1964, Ted Kennedy survived a plane crash including the pilot and his assistant were killed. It is then pulled debris from the aircraft by Senator Birch E. Bayh II.
In 1968, he delivered the eulogy for his brother Robert, assassinated. It became the patriarch of the Kennedy family, his father having become disabled in 1961 after a stroke.
Hope for the Democratic presidential election of 1972, he sees the Chappaquiddick affair put a definitive end to his ambitions.
Chappaquiddick
On July 18, 1969, following a party given on the island of Chappaquiddick, aboard his Oldsmobile Delta 88, Ted Kennedy carried out an exit route to the height of the Dike Bridge. His car plunged into the river and sank.
Ted Kennedy was not the sole occupant and his young passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, died drowned. Ted Kennedy, who tried unsuccessfully to save her, turned for help to the place where was held the evening. Kennedy spoke of the accident many people, including relatives of the victim and his lawyer before the police even prevented. A group of fishermen who found the car the next morning, then later Kopechne's body was recovered. Only when the car was identified as belonging to Ted Kennedy that he was finally interviewed by police.
The incident became a national scandal. Kennedy was criticized for failing to rescue Kopechne, and from not having first contacted the police but his lawyer, and having waited the next morning to report the accident. Many allegations were circulated, including that Ted Kennedy was drunk at the wheel of his car, did not try to save the girl and allegedly tried to abuse her. Kennedy pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of the accident. He was sentenced to two months suspended prison sentence.
The accident at Chappaquiddick will continue to haunt his political career, whose presidential ambitions will be forever broken. The reputation of Ted Kennedy was tainted, and his immaturity and weakness denounced by his opponents or his former supporters.
In 1980 he ran for the Democratic primary against President Jimmy Carter, but the scandal of Chappaquiddick appears timely and forces him to renounce for the presidential ambition.
In the years 1980-1990, the Chappaquiddick affair emerged when, with one of his nephews, he was sued for sexual harassment.
Health Issues
Ted Kennedy was hospitalized May 17, 2008 in Boston after an illness. The examinations revealed that the Senator was suffering from a malignant brain tumor. According to a statement from Dr. Lee Schwamm and Larry Ronan of Massachusetts General Hospital, published May 21, 2008, he "has not had any new ailments, remains in satisfactory condition. He walks, keeps morale is full of energy. The news was a shock to the United States. George W. Bush said he was "deeply saddened" diagnosis and assured pray for the recovery of the Democratic senator. Barack Obama, candidate for the Democratic nomination for the November presidential election, said he hoped his recovery. "Ted Kennedy is a giant in American political history. He has done more for public health than anyone in history. On June 2, the senator underwent surgery 3 h 30 at Duke University Hospital to remove as much of the tumor, operation performed with the patient awake, to avoid permanent neurological sequelae of the operation. Dr. Friedman, who performed the operation was declared successful in its objectives. Ted Kennedy should then begin chemotherapy and radiation at Massachusetts General Hospital.
The views on the evolution of the disease vary. Surgery may help extend life but typically only a few months. John H. Sampson, a neurosurgeon who worked with Dr. Friedman said that the operation is certainly not curative but increases the chances of effectiveness of additional treatments. Other medical reviewers found that people with similar tumors have survived for years.
Ted Kennedy was the victim of a malaise at the inaugural luncheon of Barack Obama January 20, 2009 and hospitalized again.
On August 25, 2009, he died at his home in Hyannis Port (Massachusetts), two weeks after his sister, Eunice Kennedy Shriver. He was 77 years.
Political Philosophy
In 1971, Ted Kennedy is still an opponent of abortion. But after the legalization of abortion by the Supreme Court of the United States (Roe v. Wade), he changed his mind after mature reflection and becomes a defender of abortion making it a prime target groups Pressure Pro-life.
Icon Democrat Ted Kennedy represents the "liberal wing" of the Democratic Party. With John Kerry, he is responsible for the reputation of liberal Massachusetts.
Kennedy was in favor of controlled immigration and quotas, and champion energy alternatives.
He announced, January 28, 2008, his support for Barack Obama against Hillary Clinton and John Edwards for the Democratic Party's primary for the 2008 presidential election.
Read also Neil Armstrong
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