Accountability

This article comes forwarded to me from a friend who lives in Italy, Texas, and he informs me it was in the local Waxachie (not sure this is the proper spelling) paper. It makes for some interesting reading if you like national politics.

Accountability

"Mary Jo Kopechne never had a chance to join the national health-care debate, nor was she buried at government expense. Kennedy-inclined journalists in Massachusetts and a few on the national level tried to do that for the political family. They also helped manage the damage for the now-deceased Kennedy brother.

On July 18, 1969, there was a party on the grounds of a secluded cottage; in attendance were six young, unmarried female staffers from Bobby Kennedy’s tragic presidential campaign and six men, only one of whom was unmarried. Thirty-seven-year-old Senator Ted Kennedy was one of the five married men at the party.

Sometime after 11 p.m. (the exact time is disputed), Sen. Ted Kennedy and Miss Kopechne left in Senator Kennedy’s car. Kennedy was familiar with the area. It was frequently used for family getaways. Nevertheless, as he much later reported to authorities, he took a wrong turn, some say purposefully – but that’s a stretch. He did recklessly launch his Oldsmobile off Dike Bridge into Poucha Pond, which connects to the saltwater of Massachusetts Bay. Ted Kennedy made it out of the vehicle alive. Miss Kopechne did not.

Kennedy, reportedly a strong swimmer at that time, said he dived down several times to try to rescue Mary Jo. At some point, the United States Senator from Massachusetts returned to the cottage where his friends were – along the way passing several houses with working telephones, as well as a firehouse with a pay phone, according to official reports. He supposedly returned with two of his fellow partiers, a cousin, Joseph Gargan, and a friend, Paul Markum, and tried to rescue Miss Kopechne.

Kennedy is reported to have returned to his motel room in Edgertown, Massachusetts, by swimming across what is referred to as the Edgertown Channel or Sound, normally a swift-flowing body of water. The time was 2:25 a.m. While it has been noted that Gargan and Markum visited with him around 7:30 the next morning, the accident was not reported to officials until about 9 a.m.

Senator Ted Kennedy’s license and a light sentence were suspended. He was not effectively punished for leaving the scene of a fatal accident. The diver who recovered the body of Mary Jo Kopechne stated that he thought she could have lived up to two hours after the accident due to what he thought was a large air pocket in the car and the position of Mary Jo’s body. In short, Sen. Kennedy’s disregard for the laws he swore an oath to uphold could have cost Mary Jo her life.

Given the power the Kennedys hold in the State of Massachusetts, it’s no wonder the inquest was held in secret by order of the State Supreme Court. A follow-up but local grand jury investigation took no action. In spite of the attending pressures, presiding judge James A. Boyle of the original inquest released a finding that Kennedy’s "negligent driving appears to have contributed to the death of Mary Jo Kopechne."

The senator was a champion of liberal causes. I would argue he was far more liberal than either of his two brothers who were assassinated, but in the one instance where his personal actions could made the difference for a regular person, he faltered. It could be argued he was responsible for her death. Even Jimmie Carter has been critical of Kennedy’s lack of action in a crisis during the 1980 Presidential campaign.

The senator’s death is now being used in an attempt to breath life into a stalled proposal for a national medical care system that could require your doctor to seek the permission of bureaucratic committees in order to treat you for serious, even life-threatening, conditions. In some cases your treatment might have to be approved by four or more committees. Your doctor could be prosecuted for moving ahead with your treatment without federal permission. The delay could cause you many hours of pain, if not your life, as it has done for others in nations with similar systems. Our senators and congressmen will, of course, have their own system – it will be better than yours. Ironically, Sen. Kennedy was a champion of the new delay-filled proposal; perhaps it could have similar effects to his delays in June 1969, which perhaps cost Mary Jo Kopechne her life."

Paul D. Perry