Robert F. Kennedy, 1925-1968

I really wish I could have lived to see him. More importantly, I wish I'd be living in a country where Robert Francis Kennedy had served two terms as President of the United States.

Richard Nixon's 6+ years were so disastrous for the country - many of the effects of Watergate are still being felt today in many ways - it's hard to even comprehend how different our country would be were it not for a madman named Sirhan Sirhan.

I'm only 36 years old, born during Nixon's first term in September 1971, but in my lifetime, I've never had the pleasure and inspiration of knowing a politician like Robert Kennedy. Barack Obama is probably the closest thing we've had in my lifetime.

I watch and read a great deal about Kennedy, and it seems as if my fascination isn't going to wane anytime soon. It's not that I'm in love with the Kennedy surname per se, it's that I have a tremendous amount of respect for what all three Kennedy brothers did and have done for our country in their political lives. Both President Kennedy and Robert Kennedy ultimately gave the ultimate sacrifice for trying to make a difference.

Specifically with RFK, after his brother was murdered in so public a manner, he easily could have said, "To hell with it, and to hell with this country." It's not like his family didn't have tens of millions of dollars for him to live off of, and really, who could have faulted him? He was crushed over his brother's death, and it was clear that the 1960s were a pretty risky time to be a politician. It's important to remember that at the time RFK was shot, 40 years ago today, his brother, Malcolm X and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had already been murdered in the decade. Kennedy clearly knew the risks, yet he pushed on, determined to try and make a difference.

As Attytood noted today, perhaps Kennedy's most shining and courageous moment came on April 4, 1968, when he was due for an appearance in Indianapolis on the day that Martin Luther King, Jr. had been assassinated. When he arrived, he was told that his predominately African-American audience was not aware that King had been murdered just hours before. He courageously went on stage anyway, speaking off-the-cuff and from-the-heart about his own experience with losing a family member, and what American needed to do to move forward. Without a speech writer, teleprompter, or polls to figure out the most popular thing to say, here is a part of what he said to the audience that night:

My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He once wrote: "Even in our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God."

What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence and lawlessness, but is love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or whether they be black.

[Interrupted by applause]

So I ask you tonight to return home, to say a prayer for the family of Martin Luther King, yeah that's true, but more importantly to say a prayer for our own country, which all of us love - a prayer for understanding and that compassion of which I spoke. We can do well in this country. We will have difficult times. We've had difficult times in the past. And we will have difficult times in the future. It is not the end of violence; it is not the end of lawlessness; and it's not the end of disorder.

But the vast majority of white people and the vast majority of black people in this country want to live together, want to improve the quality of our life, and want justice for all human beings that abide in our land.

Below is audio of his speech - take a few minutes and listen to the words, emotion and raw power (and the audience's reaction) to his speech...

Many people, mostly Republicans and conservative blowhards on right-wing radio, love to vilify the youngest Kennedy brother, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, who won't be with us much longer even with the best prognosis after being diagnosed with an aggressive form of brain cancer. It was Ted who eulogized his brother RFK in June of 1968 with these words:

My brother need not be idealized or enlarged in death beyond what he was in life, to be remembered simply as a good and decent man, who saw wrong and tried to right it, saw suffering and tried to heal it, saw war and tried to stop it.

I cannot imagine what it's been like for Ted, seeing his three older brothers die (Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. in World War II), two of them murdered, yet he still has soldiered on, making many mistakes and even a tragic one, yet he has endured to become one of the most successful U.S. Senators in U.S. history. RFK's and JFK's legacies are alive with Ted Kennedy.

It's my hope that Barack Obama can deliver the sort of hope to generations of Americans that Robert did to America during the spring of 1968 before the tragic events at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

Kennedy as he uttered the last public words of his life: "Thank you, now it's on to Chicago, and let's win there."

Rest in peace, RFK. You are gone, but not forgotten, and you never will be.