As I write this, on the morning of June 10, 2001, Senator Edward Kennedy is making what ABC This Week calls a "rare”press appearance with Cokie Roberts.  During the program prior to his segment, they announced it in a manner that was proper for those of royal birth.

The hypocrisy of this sort of treatment for a drunk who killed a woman, when compared to the press approach to George W. Bush, who was once ticketed for driving too slow after having one too many glasses of wine at dinner with his parents, is of such titanic proportions that it beggars description.

But, it is appropriate.  The hypocrisy, I mean.  Kennedy is this moment speaking about bi-partisanship.  There is no more partisan politician in America.  He is speaking about cuts in education,  talking about “mortgaging the children’s future” as the net result of the tax cuts.  ( The education bill will spend more money than ever before.)  He says Republicans are “holding hostage” the minimum wage by tying “excessive tax cuts for business” to a proposed raise.  In other words, he doesn’t mind raising prices out of one side of his mouth while saying he is on your side out of the other side of his mouth. 

(All the costs incurred by any business are reflected in the price of what they sell.  If their cost of doing business goes up, their price goes up.  Salaries are a cost of doing business.  So are corporate taxes, by the way, which is why intelligent people refer to them as “hidden” or secondary taxes.  You pay the taxes for every company in America.)

The just-signed tax cut, Kennedy said, must be revisited.  If you are older than twenty years of age, you know what it means when a liberal suggests another look at a tax cut.  If you are older than twenty years of age and don’t know what it means, you are a member or the mainstream media – by definition a congenital idiot.

Kennedy, whose frequent drunken escapades and marital infidelities never receive the attention of the liberal press – unless of course he drives off a dock in a drunken stupor and kills his date, deserves nothing but contempt.  Even when he’s sober his dissolution is so extreme that much of what he says during speeches is gibberish. 

He seems to usually be sober when he’s voting in the Senate, so that’s a plus.  The results, however, are as bad as if he was still drunk.  Unlike his brother, who knew that cutting taxes improves the economy and raises revenues to the federal treasury, Teddy believes that it is dangerous for you to handle your own money.  When he was elected to fill his brother’s vacant Senate seat after JFK illegally won the presidency, I suppose he voted for Jack’s tax cut, but since then there hasn’t been a tax cut he liked or a tax hike he didn’t support.

If you have ever been frustrated by a bonehead bureaucrat, Ted Kennedy voted for the bureau.  If you have ever been irritated by bad results from our schools, Ted Kennedy voted for the system.  If you ever thought our military wasn’t receiving the attention it deserved, Ted Kennedy voted to restrict its ability to do the job.  If you ever thought we give too much money to feed, clothe and house people who ought to go and get a job and earn their own living, Ted Kennedy voted to expand their free lunch.  If you ever wondered why we give billions to foreign dictatorships, Ted Kennedy voted to send the cash.  If you ever wondered why a woman could get a million dollar settlement from a fast food franchise because she tipped a cup of coffee on her lap, Ted Kennedy voted for the tort bill the trial lawyers wanted.  If you ever wondered how the government could use racial preferences to solve the problem of racial preferences, Ted Kennedy voted for the affirmative action legislation that makes quotas not only possible, but required!

There are others like him in Congress.  Most are Democrats.  None are treated by the press quite like they treat Teddy, though.  Perhaps it’s because none of the rest has killed somebody while in a drugged or drunken stupor, but I doubt it.  No, the press treatment of Senator Edward Kennedy has to do with King Arthur’s court.  Even the Clown from Camelot is a prince, to them.   (LL)