The 19th of July

The 18^th of July is a day that should have lived in infamy.  Unfortunately, it’s a day forgotten.  Allow me to refresh your memory.
In the early morning hours of July 18, 1969, a black Oldsmobile sedan turned down a narrow dirt road and careened away in a cloud of dust.  As the car approached a wooden bridge, the driver, who had been drinking and was no doubt well over the legal limit, failed to slow.  Too late, the driver realized his error.  The car dropped over the side of the bridge, turned over and plunged into the water.  The driver escaped the overturned and water-filled car. A 28-year-old female passenger did not.

Because the driver was a member of a wealthy and influential family, he was never a charged with any crime other than leaving the scene of an accident after causing injury.  It was indeed a tragic event, but tragic as it was, some good did come from it.  You see, had that event not occurred, that driver probably would have become the President of the United States.  And that would have been an even worse tragedy.  That driver was none other than the 37-year-old Senator Edward M. “Ted” Kennedy.

The medical examiner ruled that Mary Jo Kopechne (the female passenger) died of drowning, but no autopsy was performed. She was buried the next day.

The Koephne family received a payment of $90,904 from Kennedy and a $50,000 payout from insurance.

Kennedy later pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident after causing injury and prosecutors agreed to Kennedy’s request that a jail sentence be suspended owing to Kennedy’s age, character and prior reputation.  Judge James Boyle ruled that there was probable cause that Kennedy had committed a crime, but declined to issue an arrest warrant.  District Attorney Edmund Dinnis chose not to prosecute him for manslaughter. And then, Boyle even had the gall to claim that Kennedy “has already been, and will continue to be punished far beyond anything this court can impose.”

In reality, it was Americans who were punished. It showed that equal protection under the law is a fairy tale. The people of Massachusetts continued to re-elect Kennedy to the Senate until his death in 2009.  And although Kennedy couldn’t overcome the accident to become President, he became one of the Democratic Party’s leading Senators and used his influence and power to force upon Americans a number of egregious policies and laws, not the least of which is Obamacare.

During hearings in the run-up to Obamacare’s passage, Democrats repeatedly used the “Kennedy card” to tug at the heartstrings of lawmakers.  Kennedy had often called socialized medicine the cause of his life.